"Patience, Monsieur, you have not heard me," Perrot interposed. "I know
it after another fashion. Do you remember a rill of water which runs
through the great yard and the stables?"
La Tribe nodded.
"Grated with iron at either end and no passage for so much as a dog? You
do? Well, Monsieur, I have hunted rats there, and where the water passes
under the wall is a culvert, a man's height in length. In it is a stone,
one of those which frame the grating at the entrance, which a strong man
can remove--and the man is in!"
"Ay, in! But where?" La Tribe asked, his eyebrows drawn together.
"Well said, Monsieur, where?" Perrot rejoined in a tone of triumph.
"There lies the point. In the stables, where will be sleeping men, and a
snorer on every truss? No, but in a fairway between two stables where
the water at its entrance runs clear in a stone channel; a channel
deepened in one place that they may draw for the chambers above with a
rope and a bucket. The rooms above are the best in the house, four in
one row, opening all on the gallery; which was uncovered, in the common
fashion until Queen-Mother Jezebel, passing that way to Nantes, two years
back, found the chambers draughty; and that end of the gallery was closed
in against her return. Now, Monsieur, he and his Madame will lie there;
and he will feel safe, for there is but one way to those four
rooms--through the door which shuts off the covered gallery from the open
part. But--" he glanced up an instant and La Tribe caught the
smouldering fire in his eyes--"we shall not go in by the door."
"The bucket rises through a trap?"
"In the gallery? To be sure, monsieur. In the corner beyond the fourth
door. There shall he fall into the pit which he dug for others, and the
evil that he planned rebound on his own head!"
La Tribe was silent.
"What think you of it?" Tignonville asked.
"That it is cleverly planned," the minister answered.
"No more than that?"
"No more until I have eaten."
"Get him something!" Tignonville replied in a surly tone. "And we may as
well eat, ourselves. Lead the horses into the wood. And do you, Perrot,
call Tuez-les-Moines, who is forward. Two hours' riding should bring us
to La Fleche. We need not leave here, therefore, until the sun is low.
To dinner! To dinner!"
Probably he did not feel the indifference he affected, for his face as he
ate grew darker, and from time to time he shot a glance, barbed with
suspicion, at the minister. La Tribe on his side remained silent,
although the men ate apart. He was in doubt, indeed, as to his own
feelings. His instinct and his reason were at odds. Through all,
however, a single purpose, the rescue of Angers, held good, and gradually
other things fell into their places. When the meal was at an end, and
Tignonville challenged him, he was ready.