t
came down from the moors that morning. He was not surprised, after old
Joubard's report, to see his uncle's outdoor factotum, a bullet-headed
creature with scarcely anything on but his shirt, leading the last of
several horses into the shadowy depths of the stable. Opposite, the cook
looked out smiling from the kitchen, where she lived with her solemn
husband, the valet-de-chambre. He, in apron and sabots, was now in the
act of carrying the first dishes across to the dining-room window.

"Just in time, Monsieur Angelot!" cried the cook.

Four large black dogs came barking and leaping to meet the young man and
his dog, an intimate friend of theirs. Then a small slender figure, with
a cropped head and a clinging dark blue frock, flashed across from the
wood, ordered the dogs back in a voice that they obeyed, and clinging to
Angelot's arm, led him on towards the corner of the house.

"Ah, my Ange! I began to think you were not coming," she said. "There
are four of them in the salon with papa, and I was afraid to go in till
you came."

"What! Mademoiselle Riette afraid of anything on earth--and especially
of four old gentlemen!"

"They are not very old, and they look so fierce and secret this morning.
But come, come, you must put down your game-bag and wash your hands, and
then we will go in together."

CHAPTER II

HOW THE OWLS HOOTED IN THE DAYTIME

The sun poured into the little salon, all polished wood and gay-coloured
chintz, where Monsieur Joseph de la Mariniere and his four friends were
talking at the top of their voices.

The four guests sat in more or less tired attitudes round the room; the
host stood poised on the hearth-rug, a dark, dandy little gentleman with
a brilliant smile. He had a way of balancing himself on one foot and
slightly extending both arms, as if he were going to fly off into space.
This, and his gentle, attractive manner, sometimes touched with
melancholy, gave him a sort of angelic, spiritual air. It was difficult
to imagine him either a soldier or a conspirator, yet he had been one
and was still the other. More than once, only a politic indulgence not
often extended by Napoleon's administrators, and the distinguished
merits of his younger brother, had saved Monsieur Joseph from sharing
the fate of some of his friends at Joux, Ham, or Vincennes.

These fortress prisons held even now many men of good family whom only
the Restoration was to set free. They, as well as plenty