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Updated: May 11, 2025
Like a prudent general, I felt I must beat a retreat. The bulk of my money was in trustworthy hands in Antwerp, but in my oak chest were a hundred gold crowns of the sun a great stand-by and help in the hour of trouble. There was nothing for it but to go, and, summoning Pierrebon, I told him of my intention. We set to work to pack a valise at once. This being done, we waited for the small hours.
Giving my reins to Pierrebon I passed in with Sarlaboux, and running up the stairs reached the top of the tower. There we found Montluc standing, with half a dozen or so of his officers around him, and before him a young man, his head bare, and his hands bound behind him, stood facing Montluc. It was De Ganache.
He would, in fact, have seen Pierrebon, who after vainly trying to get at Piero unobserved had determined to warn me, and succeeded with much difficulty in making his way thus far. Through the screen of the ivy Pierrebon watched us in the room, and when I was alone he was about to step in at once, when he saw my actions, and guessed that I too was on the alert. "Good!" he thought, "he knows too.
One friend alone remained to me, and this was a young man of Orrain called Pierrebon, whom I have mentioned before. Through good and ill he adhered to me with ancient fidelity, and he lives still, honoured and trusted by all who know him. Together we sought a refuge in the Low Countries, and there I learned the first great lesson of my life, and that was to live by honest work.
And, bidding Pierrebon give the yokel a coin, we pressed forwards. It was not, however, without another careful scrutiny that I led the way into the village, where we were soon within the doors of the inn. It was a poor place, but host and hostess were kindly; and did the best they could. In the public room was the party of travellers whom the peasant had mentioned.
A little later Pierrebon, who was indulging his appetite for a good sleep, awoke from his nap, and discovered it was time to be moving. So, fording the river, we took our way north. Towards sunset we saw the walls of the priory of Ile Bouchard, around which clustered the houses of the village, like barnacles to a galley's side.
I was not, however, interested in the landscape but in the hard fact that thirty-one Henris, in round figures, would not carry me far in what I had before me. After a minute or so I came back again, and looked at the money and then at Pierrebon. It was a hopeless sum. "It is correct, monsieur," he said; "and, of course, we have the horses."
We rode in silence, for Pierrebon, to say truth, was uneasy at the uncanny stillness, and that awe with which Nature in her lonely grandeur inspires the dullest of mortals had begun to fill us. And so no word was spoken. In and out the track wound, until at last it brought us to the very heart of the forest, where the shadows lay black and deep.
Le Brusquet stepped back and seated himself on a table, and then for the first time I noticed a third person in the room a tall, soldierly man, with the collar of The Order at his neck. With a wave of his hand Le Brusquet presented me to the stranger, whom I found was M. de Lorgnac, the lieutenant of the Queen's guard he in whose house Pierrebon had obtained shelter.
I will not stop to tell, indeed I never knew, how we pushed through the crowds in the waiting-rooms and gained the outer courts; but ten minutes later De Lorgnac and I, with Pierrebon at our heels, were galloping on the Paris road, hoping almost against hope, for Simon had nearly two hours' start of us, and our horses had been ridden far and fast.
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