possessed at this time a powerful organisation; and with the aid of the
surgeon, who showed me much respect in my bereavement, and exercised in
my behalf all the influence which skilful and honest; men of his craft
invariably possess, I was able to arrange for my mother's burial in a
private ground about a league beyond the walls and near the village
of Chaverny. At the time of her death I had only thirty crowns in gold
remaining, Simon Fleix, to whose fate I could obtain no clue, having
carried off thirty-five with the horses. The whole of this residue,
however, with the exception of a handsome gratuity to the nurse and a
trifle spent on my clothes, I expended on the funeral, desiring that
no stain should rest on my mother's birth or my affection. Accordingly,
though the ceremony was of necessity private, and indeed secret, and
the mourners were few, it lacked nothing, I think, of the decency and
propriety which my mother loved; and which she preferred, I have often
heard her say, to the vulgar show that is equally at the command of the
noble and the farmer of taxes.

Until she was laid in her quiet resting-place I stood in constant fear
of some interruption on the part either of Bruhl, whose connection with
Fresnoy and the abduction I did not doubt, or of the Jacobin monk.
But none came; and nothing happening to enlighten me as to the fate of
Mademoiselle de la Vire, I saw my duty clear before me. I disposed of
the furniture of my mother's room, and indeed of everything which
was saleable, and raised in this way enough money to buy myself a new
cloak--without which I could not travel in the wintry weather--and to
hire a horse. Sorry as the animal was, the dealer required security, and
I had none to offer. It was only at the last moment, I bethought me of
the fragment of gold chain which mademoiselle had left behind her, and
which, as well as my mother's rings and vinaigrette, I had kept back
from the sale. This I was forced to lodge with him. Having thus, with
some pain and more humiliation, provided means for the journey, I lost
not an hour in beginning it. On the eighth of January I set oat for
Rosny, to carry the news of my ill-success and of mademoiselle's
position whither I had looked a week before to carry herself.

CHAPTER XII. MAXIMILIAN DE BETHUNE, BARON DE ROSNY.

I looked to make the journey to Rosny in two days. But the heaviness of
the roads and the sorry condition of my hackney hindered me so great