t the news that whilst they
had indulged themselves in their drunken slumbers their prisoners had
escaped and carried off the treasure with them. The news was received
with a groan of dismay, and several turned to the door to ascertain
for themselves whether it was indeed exact. The dreary emptiness of the
rain-washed yard afforded them more than ample confirmation.

"Where is your pig of an ostler, Mother Capoulade?" demanded the angry
Captain.

Quivering with terror, she answered him that the rascal should be in the
shed by the stables, where it was his wont to sleep. Out into the rain,
despite the scantiness of his attire, went Charlot, followed closely by
La Boulaye and one or two stragglers. The shed proved empty, as Caron
could have told him--and so, too, did the stables. Here, at the spot
where Madame de Bellecour's coachman had been left bound, the Captain
turned to La Boulaye and those others that had followed him.

"It is the ostler's work," he announced. "There was knavery and
treachery writ large upon his ugly face. I always felt it, and this
business proves how correct were my instincts. The rogue was bribed when
he discovered how things were with you, you greasy sots. But you, La
Boulaye," he cried suddenly, "were you drunk, too?"

"Not I," answered the Deputy.

"Then, name of a name, how came that lumbering coach to leave the yard
without awakening you?"

"You ask me to explain too much," was La Boulaye's cool evasion. "I have
always accounted myself a light sleeper, and I could not have believed
that such a thing could really have taken place without disturbing me.
But the fact remains that the coach has gone, and I think that instead
of standing here in idle speculation as to how it went, you might find
more profitable employment in considering how it is to brought back
again. It cannot have gone very far."

If any ray of suspicion had begun to glimmer in Charlot's brain, that
suggestion of La Boulaye's was enough to utterly extinguish it.

They returned indoors, and without more ado Tardivet set himself to plan
the pursuit. He knew, he announced, that Prussia was their destination.
He had discovered it at the time of their capture from certain papers
that he had found in a portmanteau of the Marquise's. He discussed
the matter with La Boulaye, and it was now that Caron had occasion to
congratulate himself upon his wisdom in having elected to remain behind.

The Captain proposed to recall the