The jailer’s daughter had not been mistaken; it was indeed Roland whom
she had seen in the jail speaking to the captain of the gendarmerie.
Neither was Amélie wrong in her terror. Roland was really in pursuit of
Morgan.
Although he avoided going to the Château des Noires-Fontaines, it was
not that he had the slightest suspicion of the interest his sister had
in the leader of the Companions of Jehu; but he feared the indiscretion
of one of his servants. He had recognized Charlotte at the jail, but as
the girl showed no astonishment, he believed she had not recognized him,
all the more because, after exchanging a few words with the captain,
he went out to wait for the latter on the Place du Bastion, which was
always deserted at that hour.
His duties over, the captain of gendarmerie joined him. He found Roland
impatiently walking back and forth. Roland had merely made himself
known at the jail, but here he proceeded to explain the matter, and to
initiate the captain into the object of his visit.
Roland had solicited the First Consul, as a favor to himself, that the
pursuit of the Companions of Jehu be intrusted to him personally, a
favor he had obtained without difficulty. An order from the minister
of war placed at his disposal not only the garrison of Bourg, but also
those of the neighboring towns. An order from the minister of police
enjoined all the officers of the gendarmerie to render him every
assistance.
He naturally applied in the first instance to the captain of the
gendarmerie at Bourg, whom he had long known personally as a man of
great courage and executive ability. He found what he wanted in him.
The captain was furious against the Companions of Jehu, who had stopped
diligences within a mile of his town, and on whom he was unable to lay
his hand. He knew of the reports relating to the last three stoppages
that had been sent to the minister of police, and he understood the
latter’s anger. But Roland brought his amazement to a climax when he
told him of the night he had spent at the Chartreuse of Seillon, and
of what had happened to Sir John at that same Chartreuse during the
succeeding night.
The captain had heard by common rumor that Madame de Montrevel’s guest
had been stabbed; but as no one had lodged a complaint, he did not think
he had the right to investigate circumstances which it seemed to
him Roland wished to keep in the dark. In those troublous days more
indulgence was shown to officers of the army than they might have
received at other times.
As for Roland, he had said nothing because he wished to reserve for
himself the satisfaction of pursuing the assassins and sham ghosts of
the Chartreuse when the time came. He now arrived with full power to put
that design into execution, firmly resolved not to return to the
First Consul until it was accomplished. Besides, it was one of those
adventures he was always seeking, at once dangerous and picturesque, an
opportunity of pitting his life against men who cared little for their
own, and probably less for his. Roland had no conception of Morgan’s
safe-guard which had twice protected him from danger--once on the night
he had watched at the Chartreuse, and again when he had fought against
Cadoudal. How could he know that a simple cross was drawn above his
name, and that this symbol of redemption guaranteed his safety from one
end of France to the other?
For the rest, the first thing to be done was to surround the Chartreuse
of Seillon, and to search thoroughly into its most secret places--a
thing Roland believed himself perfectly competent to do.
The night was now too far advanced to undertake the expedition, and it
was postponed until the one following. In the meantime Roland remained
quietly in hiding in the captain’s room at the barracks that no one
might suspect his presence at Bourg nor its cause. The following night
he was to guide the expedition. In the course of the morrow, one of the
gendarmes, who was a tailor, agreed to make him a sergeant’s uniform. He
was to pass as a member of the brigade at Sons-le-Saulnier, and, thanks
to the uniform, could direct the search at the Chartreuse without being
recognized.
Everything happened as planned. Roland entered the barracks with the
captain about one o’clock, ascended to the latter’s room, where he slept
on a bed on the floor like a man who has just passed two days and two
nights in a post-chaise. The next day he restrained his impatience
by drawing a plan of the Chartreuse of Seillon for the captain’s
instruction, with which, even without Roland’s help, that worthy officer
could have directed the expedition without going an inch astray.
As the captain had but eighteen men under him, and it was not possible
to surround the monastery completely with that number, or rather, to
guard the two exits and make a thorough search through the interior,
and, as it would have taken three or four days to bring in all the men
of the brigade scattered throughout the neighborhood, the officer, by
Roland’s order, went to the colonel of dragoons, garrisoned at Bourg,
told him of the matter in hand, and asked for twelve men, who, with his
own, made thirty in all.
The colonel not only granted the twelve men, but, learning that
the expedition was to be commanded by Colonel Roland de Montrevel,
aide-de-camp to the First Consul, he proposed that he himself should
join the party at the head of his twelve men.
Roland accepted his co-operation, and it was agreed that the colonel (we
employ the words colonel and chief of brigade indifferently, both being
interchangeable terms indicating the same rank) and his twelve dragoons
should pick up Roland, the captain, and his eighteen men, the barracks
being directly on their road to the Chartreuse. The time was set for
eleven that night.
At eleven precisely, with military punctuality, the colonel of dragoons
and his twelve men joined the gendarmes, and the two companies, now
united in one, began their march. Roland, in his sergeant’s uniform,
made himself known to his brother colonel; but to the dragoons and
gendarmes he remained, as agreed upon, a sergeant detached from the
brigade at Sons-le-Saulnier. Only, as it might otherwise have seemed
extraordinary that a sergeant, wholly unfamiliar with these localities,
should be their guide, the men were told that Roland had been in his
youth a novice at Seillon, and was therefore better acquainted than most
persons with the mysterious nooks of the Chartreuse.
The first feeling of these brave soldiers had been a slight humiliation
at being guided by an ex-monk; but, on the other hand, as that ex-monk
wore the three-cornered hat jauntily, and as his whole manner and
appearance was that of a man who has completely forgotten that he
formerly wore a cowl, they ended by accepting the humiliation, and
reserved their final judgment on the sergeant until they could see how
he handled the musket he carried on his arm, the pistols he wore in his
belt, and the sword that hung at his side.
The party was supplied with torches, and started in perfect silence.
They were divided into three squads; one of eight men, led by the
captain of gendarmerie, another of ten, commanded by the colonel, and
the third of twelve men, with Roland at its head. On leaving the town
they separated.
The captain of the gendarmerie, who knew the localities better than
the colonel of dragoons, took upon himself to guard the window of La
Correrie, giving upon the forest of Seillon, with his eight men.
The colonel of dragoons was commissioned by Roland to watch the main
entrance of the Chartreuse; with him were five gendarmes and five
dragoons. Roland was to search the interior, taking with him five
gendarmes and seven dragoons.
Half an hour was allowed each squad to reach its post; it was more
than was needed. Roland and his men were to scale the orchard wall when
half-past eleven was ringing from the belfry at Péronnaz. The captain
of gendarmerie followed the main road from Pont d’Ain to the edge of
the woods, which he skirted until he reached his appointed station. The
colonel of dragoons took the crossroad which branches from the highway
of Pont d’Ain and leads to the great portal of the Chartreuse. Roland
crossed the fields to the orchard wall which, as the reader will
remember, he had already climbed on two occasions.
Punctually at half-past eleven he gave the signal to his men to scale
the wall. By the time they reached the other side the men, if they
did not yet know that Roland was brave, were at least sure that he was
active.
Roland pointed in the dusk to a door--the one that led from the orchard
into the cloister. Then he sprang ahead through the rank grasses; first,
he opened the door; first, he entered the cloister.
All was dark, silent and solitary. Roland, still guiding his men,
reached the refectory. Absolute solitude; utter silence.
They crossed the hall obliquely, and returned to the garden without
alarming a living creature except the owls and the bats. There still
remained the cistern, the mortuary vault, and the pavilion, or rather,
the chapel in the forest, to be searched. Roland crossed the open space
between the cistern and the monastery. After descending the steps, he
lighted three torches, kept one, and handed the other two, one to
a dragoon, the other to a gendarme; then he raised the stone that
concealed the stairway.
The gendarmes who followed Roland began to think him as brave as he was
active.
They followed the subterranean passage to the first gate; it was closed
but not locked. They entered the funereal vault. Here was more than
solitude, more than silence; here was death. The bravest felt a shiver
in the roots of their hair.
Roland went from tomb to tomb, sounding each with the butt of the pistol
he held in his hand. Silence everywhere. They crossed the vault, reached
the second gate, and entered the chapel. The same silence, the same
solitude; all was deserted, as it seemed, for years. Roland went
straight to the choir; there lay the blood on the stones; no one had
taken the trouble to efface it. Here was the end of his search, which
had proved futile. Roland could not bring himself to retreat. He fancied
he was not attacked because of his numerous escort; he therefore left
ten men and a torch in the chapel, told them to put themselves in
communication, through the ruined window, with the captain of the
gendarmerie, who was ambushed in the forest within a few feet of the
window, while he himself, with two men, retraced his steps.
This time the two men who followed Roland thought him more than brave,
they considered him foolhardy. But Roland, caring little whether they
followed or not, retraced his own steps in default of those of the
bandits. The two men, ashamed, followed him.
Undoubtedly the Chartreuse was deserted. When Roland reached the great
portal, he called to the colonel of dragoons; he and his men were
at their post. Roland opened the door and joined them. They had seen
nothing, heard nothing. The whole party entered the monastery, closing
and barricading the door behind them to cut off the bandits’ retreat,
if they were fortunate enough to meet any. Then they hastened to rejoin
their comrades, who, on their side, had united with the captain and his
eight men, and were waiting for them in the choir.
There was nothing for it but to retire. Two o’clock had just struck;
nearly three hours had been spent in fruitless search. Roland,
rehabilitated in the estimation of the gendarmes and the dragoons, who
saw that the ex-novice did not shirk danger, regretfully gave the signal
for retreat by opening the door of the chapel which looked toward the
forest.
This time Roland merely closed the door behind him, there being no
longer any hope of encountering the brigands. Then the little troop
returned to Bourg at a quick step. The captain of gendarmerie, with his
eighteen men and Roland, re-entered the barracks, while the colonel and
his twelve men continued on their way toward the town.
It was the sentinel’s call, as he challenged the captain and his party,
which had attracted the attention of Morgan and Valensolle; and it was
the noise of their return to the barracks which interrupted the
supper, and caused Morgan to cry out at this unforeseen circumstance:
“Attention!”
In fact, in the present situation of these young men, every circumstance
merited attention. So the meal was interrupted. Their jaws ceased to
work to give the eyes and ears full scope. It soon became evident that
the services of their eyes were alone needed.
Each gendarme regained his room without light. The numerous barrack
windows remained dark, so that the watchers were able to concentrate
their attention on a single point.
Among those dark windows, two were lighted. They stood relatively back
from the rest of the building, and directly opposite to the one where
the young men were supping. These windows were on the first floor, but
in the position the watchers occupied at the top of bales of hay, Morgan
and Valensolle were not only on a level, but could even look down into
them. These windows were those of the room of the captain of gendarmes.
Whether from indifference on the worthy captain’s part, or by reason of
State penury, the windows were bare of curtains, so that, thanks to the
two candles which the captain had lighted in his guest’s honor, Morgan
and Valensolle could see everything that took place in this room.
Suddenly Morgan grasped Valensolle’s arm, and pressed it with all his
might.
“Hey” said Valensolle “what now?”
Roland had just thrown his three-cornered hat on a chair and Morgan had
recognized him.
“Roland de Montrevel!” he exclaimed, “Roland in a sergeant’s uniform!
This time we are on his track while he is still seeking ours. It
behooves us not to lose it.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Valensolle, observing that his friend
was preparing to leave him.
“Inform our companions. You stay here and do not lose sight of him. He
has taken off his sword, and laid his pistols aside, therefore it is
probable he intends to spend the night in the captain’s room. To-morrow
I defy him to take any road, no matter which, without one of us at his
heels.”
And Morgan sliding down the declivity of the hay, disappeared from
sight, leaving his companion crouched like a sphinx, with his eyes fixed
on Roland de Montrevel.
A quarter of an hour later Morgan returned. By this time the officer’s
windows were dark like all the others of the barracks.
“Well?” asked Morgan.
“Well,” replied Valensolle, “it ended most prosaically. They undressed
themselves, blew out the candles, and lay down, the captain on his bed,
Roland on a mattress. They are probably trying to outsnore each other at
the present moment.”
“In that case,” said Morgan, “good-night to them, and to us also.”
Ten minutes later the wish was granted, and the two young men were
sleeping, as if they did not have danger for a bed-fellow.