Part 6 (1/2)

”Is anyone here?” he queried sharply

Nothing but silence answered him For a moment he reure carved in stone He had just a sufficiency of presence of mind and of will power not to drop the candle, to stand there motionless, with his back turned to the woman and to the men who had crowded in, in his wake He would not let therave superstitious fear, which distorted every line of his pallid face

He did not ask about the child He would not trust himself to speak, for he had realised already how colish spies had watched their opportunity, had worked on the credulity and the fears of the Leridans and, playing the game at which they and their audacious chief were such unconquerable experts, they had made their way into the house under a clever ruse

Thethe situation, were questioning the Leridans The man, too, corroborated his wife's story Their anxiety had been worked upon at the moment that it was most acute After the citizen Representative left the, they had received another e which they had been unable to read, but which had greatly increased their alarm Then, when the men of the Surete came Ah! they had no cause to doubt that they were men of the Surete! their clothes, their speech, their appearancefigure to yourself, even their uniforly The Leridans were so thankful to see them! Then they made themselves happy in the two rooht down from its attic and put to sleep in the one room with the men of the Surete

After that the Leridans went to bed Na! hoere they to blame? Those men and the child had disappeared, but they (the Leridans) would go to the guillotine swearing that they were not to blame

Whether Chauvelin heard all these jeremiads, he could not afterwards have told you But he did not need to be told how it had all been done It had all been so sienious, so like the methods usually adopted by that astute Scarlet Pimpernel! He saw it all so clearly before him nobody was to blame really, save he himself-he, who alone knew and understood the adversary hom he had to deal

But these people here should not have the gratuitous spectacle of athe tore Whatever Chauvelin was suffering noould for ever remain the secret of his own soul Anon, when the Leridans' rasping voices died away in one of the more distant portions of the house and the ratuity from the two terrified wretches, he had put down the candle with a steady hand and then walked with a firure ed up in the gloom as he strode back rapidly towards the city

XII

Citizen Fouquier-Tinville had returned ho His household in his sis in the Place Dauphine was already abed: his wife and the tere asleep He hi-rooown and slippers, and with the late edition of the Moniteur in his hand, too tired to read

It was half-past ten when there ca at the front door bell Fouquier-Tinville, half expecting citizen Chauvelin to pay him a final visit, shuffled to the door and opened it

A visitor, tall, well-dressed, exceedingly polite and urbane, requested a few minutes' conversation with citizen Fouquier-Tinville

Before the Public Prosecutor had made up his mind whether to introduce such a late-coh the door into the ante-chamber, and with a movement as swift as it was unexpected, had thrown a scarf round Fouquier-Tinville's neck and wound it round his mouth, so that the unfortunate man's call for help was smothered in his throat

So dexterously and so rapidly indeed had the miscreant acted, that his victim had hardly realised the assault before he found hied and bound to a chair in his own ante-room, whilst that dare-devil stood before him, perfectly at his ease, his hands buried in the capacious pockets of his huge caped coat, and y

”I entreat you to forgive, citizen,” he was saying in an even and pleasant voice, ”this necessary violence on ent, and I could not allow your neighbours or your household to disturb the few ed to have with you My friend Paul Mole,” he went on, after a slight pause, ”is in grave danger of his life owing to a hallucination on the part of our mutual friend citizen Chauvelin; and I feel confident that you yourself are too deeply ena an innocent and honest patriot to the guillotine”

Onceinterlocutor, ith ainst the cords that held hi out of their sockets in an access of fear and of rage, was indeed presenting a pitiful spectacle

”I dare say that by now, citizen,” the brigand continued iuessed who I am You and I have oft crossed invisible swords before; but this, methinks, is the first time that we have met face to face I pray you, tell my dear friend M Chauvelin that you have seen me Also that there were two facts which he left entirely out of his calculations, perfect though these were The one fact was that there were two Paul Moles-one real and one factitious Tell him that, I pray you It was the factitious Paul Mole who stole the ring and who stood for oneinto clever citizen Chauvelin's eyes But that same factitious Paul Mole had disappeared in the crowd even before your colleague had recovered his presence of mind Tell him, I pray you, that the elusive Piuise He discovered the real Paul Mole first, studied him, learned his personality, until his own became a perfect replica of the miserable caitiff It was the false Paul Mole who induced Jeannette Marechal to introduce hiinally into the household of citizen Marat It was he who gained the confidence of his employer; he, for a consideration, borrowed the identity papers of his real prototype He again who for a few francs induced the real Paul Mole to follow hile there with the throng He who thrust the identity papers back into the hands of their rightful ohilst he himself ed up by the crowd But it was the real Paul Mole as finally arrested and who is now lingering in the Abbaye prison, whence you, citizen Fouquier-Tinville,yourself for the nightmares of your friend”

”The second fact,” he went on with the saood-humoured pleasantry, ”which our friend citizen Chauvelin had forgotten was that, though I happen to have aroused his unconquerable ire, I aentlemen Their chief, I am proud to say; but without them, I should be powerless Without one of them near me, by the side of thein tih hands searched me to my skin Without them, I could not have taken Madeleine Lannoy's child from out that terrible hell, to which a e had condemned the poor innocent But while citizen Chauvelin, racked with triu from the Leridans' house to yours, and thence to the Abbaye prison, to gloat over his captive eneue of the Scarlet Pimpernel carefully laid and carried out its plans at leisure Disguised as e of the Leridans' terror to obtain access into the house Frightened to death by our warnings, as well as by citizen Chauvelin's threats, they not only admitted us into their house, but actually placed Madeleine Lannoy's child in our charge Then they went contentedly to bed, and we, before the real men of the Surete arrived upon the scene, were already safely out of the way My gallant English friends are so Madeleine Lannoy and her child into safety They will return to Paris, citizen,” continued the audacious adventurer, with a laugh full of joy and of unconquerable vitality, ”and be my henchmen as before in many an adventure which will cause you and citizen Chauvelin to gnash your teeth with rage But I htly ”Yes, in Paris; under your very nose, and entirely at your service!”

The next second he was gone, and Fouquier-Tinville was left to marvel if the whole apparition had not been a hideous dreaed and tied to a chair with cords: and here his wife found him, an hour later, when she woke from her first sleep, anxious because he had not yet come to bed

II

A QUESTION OF PassPORTS

Bibot was very sure of himself There never was, never had been, there never would be again another such patriotic citizen of the Republic as was citizen Bibot of the Town Guard

And because his patriotis the members of the Co hatred of the aristocrats so highly appreciated, citizen Bibot had been given the most important military post within the city of Paris

He was in cohly he was estee on inside and out of the Porte Montmartre than in any other quarter of Paris The last co allowed a whole batch of aristocrats-traitors to the Republic, all of theh the Porte Montmartre and to find safety outside the walls of Paris Ferney pleaded in his defence that these traitors had been spirited away froency, for surely thataristocrats-traitors, all of them-from the clutches of Madame la Guillotine must be either the devil hients