ng. If you surrounded
Mademoiselle de Verneuil's house now, you will only warn her. Neither
you, nor I, nor your Blues and your battalions are strong enough to
get the better of that girl if she takes it into her head to save the
_ci-devant_. The fellow is brave, and consequently wily; he is a young
man full of daring. We can never get hold of him as he enters Fougeres.
Perhaps he is here already. Domiciliary visit? Absurdity! that's no
good, it will only give them warning."

"Well," said Hulot impatiently, "I shall tell the sentry on the Place
Saint-Leonard to keep his eye on the house, and pass word along the
other sentinels, if a young man enters it; as soon as the signal reaches
me I shall take a corporal and four men and--"

"--and," said Corentin, interrupting the old soldier, "if the young man
is not the marquis, or if the marquis doesn't go in by the front door,
or if he is already there, if--if--if--what then?"

Corentin looked at the commandant with so insulting an air of
superiority that the old soldier shouted out: "God's thousand thunders!
get out of here, citizen of hell! What have I got to do with your
intrigues? If that cockchafer buzzes into my guard-room I shall shoot
him; if I hear he is in a house I shall surround that house and take him
when he leaves it and shoot him, but may the devil get me if I soil my
uniform with any of your tricks."

"Commandant, the order of the ministers states that you are to obey
Mademoiselle de Verneuil."

"Let her come and give them to me herself and I'll see about it."

"Well, citizen," said Corentin, haughtily, "she shall come. She shall
tell you herself the hour at which she expects the _ci-devant_. Possibly
she won't be easy till you do post the sentinels round the house."

"The devil is made man," thought the old leader as he watched Corentin
hurrying up the Queen's Staircase at the foot of which this scene had
taken place. "He means to deliver Montauran bound hand and foot, with no
chance to fight for his life, and I shall be harrassed to death with a
court-martial. However," he added, shrugging his shoulders, "the Gars
certainly is an enemy of the Republic, and he killed my poor Gerard, and
his death will make a noble the less--the devil take him!"

He turned on the heels of his boots and went off, whistling the
Marseillaise, to inspect his guard-rooms.

* * * * *

Mademoiselle de Verneuil was absorbed in one of those medit