hose of the gendarmes and the dragoons,
nine belonged to the Companions of Jehu. Five of the latter were still
living; overwhelmed by numbers, crippled by wounds, they were taken
alive. The gendarmes and the dragoons, twenty-five in number, surrounded
them.

The captain of gendarmes had his arm shattered, the colonel of dragoons
was wounded in the thigh. Roland alone, covered with blood that was
not his own, had not a scratch. Two of the prisoners were so grievously
wounded that it was impossible for them to walk, and the soldiers were
obliged to carry them on an improvised litter. Torches were lighted, and
the whole troop, with the prisoners, took the road to the town.

As they were leaving the forest to branch into the high-road, the gallop
of a horse was heard. It came on rapidly. "Go on," said Roland; "I will
stay here and find out what this means."

It was a rider, who, as we have said, was advancing at full speed.

"Who goes there?" cried Roland, raising his carbine when the rider was
about twenty paces from him.

"One more prisoner, Monsieur de Montrevel," replied the rider, "I could
not be in at the fight, but I will at least go to the scaffold. Where
are my friends?"

"There, sir," replied Roland, who had recognized, not the face, but the
voice of the rider, a voice which he now heard for the third time. As he
spoke, he pointed to the little group in the centre of the soldiers who
were making their way along the road from Ceyzeriat to Bourg.

"I am glad to see that no harm has befallen you, M. de Montrevel,"
said the young man, with great courtesy; "I assure you it gives me
much happiness." And spurring his horse, he was beside the soldiers and
gendarmes in a few strides. "Pardon me, gentlemen," he said, springing
from his horse, "I claim a place among my three friends, the Vicomte de
Jayat, the Comte de Valensolle, and the Marquis de Ribier."

The three prisoners gave a cry of admiration and held out their hands to
their friend. The two wounded men lifted themselves up on their litters,
and murmured: "Well done, Sainte-Hermine, well done!"

"I do believe, God help me!" cried Roland, "that those brigands will
have the nobler side of the affair!"

CHAPTER L. CADOUDAL AT THE TUILERIES

The day but one after the events which we have just related took place,
two men were walking side by side up and down the grand salon of the
Tuileries. They were talking eagerly, accompanying their words with
has