ter crossing their weapons, each averted
his eyes the instant they met. The worthy old d'Hauteserre, poised on
his long thin legs like a heron, was standing beside the stout form of
the mayor, in an attitude expressive of utter stupefaction. The mayor,
though dressed as a bourgeois, always looked like a servant. Each gazed
with a bewildered eye at the gendarmes, in whose clutches Gothard was
still sobbing, his hands purple and swollen from the tightness of the
cord that bound them. Catherine maintained her attitude of artless
simplicity, which was quite impenetrable. The corporal, who, according
to Corentin, had committed a great blunder in arresting these smaller
fry, did not know whether to stay where he was or to depart. He stood
pensively in the middle of the salon, his hand on the hilt of his sabre,
his eye on the two Parisians. The Durieus, also stupefied, and the
other servants of the chateau made an admirable group of expressive
uneasiness. If it had not been for Gothard's convulsive snifflings those
present could have heard the flies fly.

When Madame d'Hauteserre, pale and terrified, opened the door and
entered the room, almost carried by Mademoiselle Goujet, whose red eyes
had evidently been weeping, all faces turned to her at once. The two
agents hoped as much as the household feared to see Laurence enter. This
spontaneous movement of both masters and servants seemed produced by
the sort of mechanism which makes a number of wooden figures perform the
same gesture or wink the same eye.

Madame d'Hauteserre advanced by three rapid strides towards Corentin and
said, in a broken voice but violently: "For pity's sake, monsieur,
tell me what my sons are accused of. Do you really think they have been
here?"

The abbe, who seemed to be saying to himself when he saw the old lady,
"She will certainly commit some folly," lowered his eyes.

"My duty and the mission I am engaged in forbid me to tell you,"
answered Corentin, with a gracious but rather mocking air.

This refusal, which the detestable politeness of the vulgar fop seemed
to make all the more emphatic, petrified the poor mother, who fell into
a chair beside the Abbe Goujet, clasped her hands and began to pray.

"Where did you arrest that blubber?" asked Corentin, addressing the
corporal and pointing to Laurence's little henchman.

"On the road that leads to the farm along the park walls; the little
scamp had nearly reached the Closeaux woods," replied