ey finally submitted to their fate, and were bound one
by one by Bertram and his attendants. When Pere Tranchard pretended to
assist in tying Letour, he managed to whisper to him--

"In two hours you will be freed. Take care to remove the deposits from
the secret chamber underneath; the secret is betrayed."

As soon as they had secured the prisoners. Bertram and Develour locked
the outer doors, and then passed through that over which Develour had
stood guard into a smaller chamber without any apparent outlet. Bertram
ordered Tranchard to show them the means of egress from that room.

"There are two," replied the pere, who had managed to lay hold of a
bottle of wine before he left the supper-room, and with which he had
fortified his inner man. "One, here to the right, leads into the
garden, and the other, to the left, opens on a staircase which brings
you into Mademoiselle Develour's boudoir."

"Open the one to the left. Quick, quick! Caleb may need help!" exclaimed
Bertram.

The pere obeyed by touching a spring, which caused one of the panels to
slide aside. They all then rushed up the stairs into the room, into
which the reader has been introduced in a previous chapter. But the room
was now vacant, the windows open, and not a sign of a human being
anywhere. Develour, who had hitherto acted in silence, absorbed in his
anxiety for the safety of Louise, now broke forth in bitter reproaches
to Bertram--

"This, then, is your boasted wisdom! this the end of all your promises
of success! Caleb assured me that in this room I should find her, and
receive her safely into my arms. Where is she now? Where is Caleb, and
what has become of Filmot? Have I lost both Louise and my friend? But
here is another door; let us see what it conceals."

Turning the key, he beheld Madame Georgiana lying upon a sofa reading
"Indiana," and making notes to it with a pencil. When Bertram saw who
the occupant of the room was, he whispered--

"Speak not; she knows your voice. I will interrogate her."

But, before he had time to say a word, she rose and inquired if they had
come to release her?

"Release you from what?"

"From the confinement to which a burly savage, a friend of yours, I
suppose, has condemned me." She then began to relate what had taken
place in that room a few minutes before their entrance.

"And whither have they gone? and how long ago?"

"They left about ten minutes before you entered; as to whither, I do not
know.