gigantic
effort. I am overcome. His great fingers fasten with a desperate
clutch upon my throat. He will tear out my gullet.

I become insensible.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

When I come to myself I am seated on the box of the carriage which had
conveyed Cecile and M. Andre to the chateau. It had passed us on its
way back.

We are near Benevent.

It is three strong men's work inside the chaise to restrain Marc and
keep him from murdering them.

We drive to the office of police. A little crowd follows us. I am able
to give some formal evidence. Then I am taken home. The unfortunate
man is placed under proper restraint. There is a great buzz of
excitement in Benevent.

Nobody recognises Marc; he is so changed. I do not disclose his name.
It is better to wait the course of events.

After the fearful peril of the last hour, I am astonished to find myself
alive. I am alive, and thankful.

After the struggle in the defile I was unable to leave my bed for some
days. I had been much tried both in mind and body; but I received the
kindest attention from the good friends around me.

In these little places every trifle creates a mighty stir. All Benevent
came to inquire after my health. I had been killed. No; well, then,
nearly done to death by a murderous assassin escaped from the galleys.
The police knew him. It was the same man who five years before had
attempted the life of the Emperor. He had a homicidal mania. There
were a hundred different reports--none of them true.

I was examined and re-examined; examined again, and cross-examined. You
have formed the conclusion that I am a witness, if I choose, out of whom
not much can be got. I battled the Maire, the prefect, the police. I
had been attacked by a man who carried a pistol, and I was rescued by
some persons returning from M. Andre's chateau in a chaise. What could
be more simple? And these are the facts duly entered--wrapped in plenty
of official verbiage--in police record.

I had everybody's sympathy. I had something better. Sympathy one can't
spend; francs one can. A subscription was raised for my benefit. I was
compelled to accept the money--a thousand francs of it. The rest--some
odd hundreds of francs and a bundle of warm clothing, intended for me by
some Benevent valetudinarian, together with thirteen copies of religious
books and two rosaries--I presented to the cure for di