e made at the
cafes, and narratives relating to deeds carrying with them the penalty
of death circulated freely through all the billiard-halls in the land.
Such was the importance which the culprits and the public attached to
the police.

These men of blood and terror assembled in society in the evening,
and discussed their nocturnal expeditions as if they had been mere
pleasure-parties.

Lepretre, Hyvert, Amiet and Guyon were arraigned before the tribunal
of a neighboring department. No one save the Treasury had suffered from
their attack, and there was no one to identify them save the lady
who took very good care not to do so. They were therefore acquitted
unanimously.

Nevertheless, the evidence against them so obviously called for
conviction, that the Ministry was forced to appeal from this decision.
The verdict was set aside; but such was the government's vacillation,
that it hesitated to punish excesses that might on the morrow be
regarded as virtues. The accused were cited before the tribunal of
Ain, in the city of Bourg, where dwelt a majority of their friends,
relatives, abettors and accomplices. The Ministry sought to propitiate
the one party by the return of its victims, and the other by the almost
inviolate safeguards with which it surrounded the prisoners. The return
to prison indeed resembled nothing less than a triumph.

The trial recommenced. It was at first attended by the same results as
the preceding one. The four accused were protected by an alibi, patently
false, but attested by a hundred signatures, and for which they could
easily have obtained ten thousand. All moral convictions must fail
in the presence of such authoritative testimony. An acquittal seemed
certain, when a question, perhaps involuntarily insidious, from the
president, changed the aspect of the trial.

"Madam," said he to the lady who had been so kindly assisted by one
of the highwaymen, "which of these men was it who tendered you such
thoughtful attention?"

This unexpected form of interrogation confused her ideas. It is probable
that she believed the facts to be known, and saw in this a means of
modifying the fate of the man who interested her.

"It was that gentleman," said she, pointing to Lepretre. The four
accused, who were included in a common alibi, fell by this one admission
under the executioner's axe. They rose and bowed to her with a smile.

"Faith!" said Hyvert, falling back upon his bench with a burst of
lau