lakeney prepared to wend his way back to another
part of the city, he suddenly saw Armand walking slowly up the street.

The young man did not look either to right or left; he held his head
forward on his chest, and his hands were hidden underneath his cloak.
When he passed immediately under one of the street lamps Blakeney caught
sight of his face; it was pale and drawn. Then he turned his head,
and for the space of two seconds his eyes across the narrow street
encountered those of his chief. He had the presence of mind not to make
a sign or to utter a sound; he was obviously being followed, but in
that brief moment Sir Percy had seen in the young man's eyes a look that
reminded him of a hunted creature.

"What have those brutes been up to with him, I wonder?" he muttered
between clenched teeth.

Armand soon disappeared under the doorway of the same house where he
had been lodging all along. Even as he did so Blakeney saw the two spies
gather together like a pair of slimy lizards, and whisper excitedly
one to another. A third man, who obviously had been dogging Armand's
footsteps, came up and joined them after a while.

Blakeney could have sworn loudly and lustily, had it been possible to
do so without attracting attention. The whole of Armand's history in
the past twenty-four hours was perfectly clear to him. The young man had
been made free that he might prove a decoy for more important game.

His every step was being watched, and he still thought Jeanne Lange in
immediate danger of death. The look of despair in his face proclaimed
these two facts, and Blakeney's heart ached for the mental torture which
his friend was enduring. He longed to let Armand know that the woman he
loved was in comparative safety.

Jeanne Lange first, and then Armand himself; and the odds would be very
heavy against the Scarlet Pimpernel! But that Marguerite should not have
to mourn an only brother, of that Sir Percy made oath.

He now turned his steps towards his own former lodgings by St. Germain
l'Auxerrois. It was just possible that Armand had succeeded in leaving a
message there for him. It was, of course, equally possible that when he
did so Heron's men had watched his movements, and that spies would be
stationed there, too, on the watch.

But that risk must, of course, be run. Blakeney's former lodging was the
one place that Armand would know of to which he could send a message to
his chief, if he wanted to do so. Of course, t