ut that at the very moment
upon which I formed the resolution Abdon drew my attention to a dark
shadow by the roadside not twenty paces in front of us. This proved to
be the motionless figure of a horseman.

As soon as I was assured of it, I reined in my horse, and taking a
pistol from the holster, I levelled it at the shadow, accompanying the
act by a sonorous--

"Who goes there?"

The shadow stirred, and Michelot's voice answered me:

"'T is I, Monsieur. They have arrived. I came to warn you."

"Who has arrived?" I shouted.

"The soldiers. They are lodged at the Lys de France."

An oath was the only comment I made as I turned the news over in my
mind. I must return to Canaples.

Then another thought occurred to me. The Chevalier was capable of going
to extremes to keep me from entering his house; he might for instance
greet me with a blunderbuss. It was not the fear of that that deterred
me, but the fear that did a charge of lead get mixed with my poor brains
before I had said what I went to say, matters would be no better, and
there would be one poor knave the less to adorn the world.

"What shall we do, Michelot?" I groaned, appealing in my despair to my
henchman.

"Might it not be well to seek speech with M. de Montresor?" quoth he.

I shrugged my shoulders. Nevertheless, after a moment's deliberation I
determined to make the attempt; if I succeeded something might come of
it.

And so I pushed on to Blois with my knaves close at my heels.

Up the Rue Vieille we proceeded with caution, for the hostelry of the
Vigne d'Or, where Michelot had hired me a room, fortunately overlooking
the street, fronted the Lys de France, where St. Auban and his men were
housed.

I gained that room of mine without mishap, and my first action was to
deal summarily with a fat and well-roasted capon which the landlord
set before me--for an empty stomach is a poor comrade in a desperate
situation. That meal, washed down with the best part of a bottle of red
Anjou, did much to restore me alike in body and in mind.

From my open window I gazed across the street at the Lys de France.
The door of the common-room, opening upon the street, was set wide, and
across the threshold came a flood of light in which there flitted the
black figures of maybe a dozen amazed rustics, drawn thither for all the
world as bats are drawn to a glare.

And there they hovered with open mouths and stupid eyes, hearkening to
the din of voices that