e on; then take me where you please, for I am ready to
go with you."

To the officer this request seemed a just one: he signed to his men to
let the driver and the horses go on; and, they, who had waited only
for this, lost no time in breaking through the crowd, which melted away
before them; thus the woman escaped for whose safety the prisoner seemed
so much concerned.

Sainte-Croix kept his promise and offered no resistance; for some
moments he followed the officer, surrounded by a crowd which seemed to
have transferred all its curiosity to his account; then, at the corner
of the Quai de d'Horloge, a man called up a carriage that had not been
observed before, and Sainte-Croix took his place with the same haughty
and disdainful air that he had shown throughout the scene we have just
described. The officer sat beside him, two of his men got up behind, and
the other two, obeying no doubt their master's orders, retired with a
parting direction to the driver,

"The Bastille!"

Our readers will now permit us to make them more fully acquainted with
the man who is to take the first place in the story. The origin of
Gaudin de Sainte-Croix was not known: according to one tale, he was the
natural son of a great lord; another account declared that he was the
offspring of poor people, but that, disgusted with his obscure birth, he
preferred a splendid disgrace, and therefore chose to pass for what he
was not. The only certainty is that he was born at Montauban, and in
actual rank and position he was captain of the Tracy regiment. At the
time when this narrative opens, towards the end of 1665, Sainte-Croix
was about twenty-eight or thirty, a fine young man of cheerful and
lively appearance, a merry comrade at a banquet, and an excellent
captain: he took his pleasure with other men, and was so impressionable
a character that he enjoyed a virtuous project as well as any plan for
a debauch; in love he was most susceptible, and jealous to the point
of madness even about a courtesan, had she once taken his fancy; his
prodigality was princely, although he had no income; further, he was
most sensitive to slights, as all men are who, because they are placed
in an equivocal position, fancy that everyone who makes any reference to
their origin is offering an intentional insult.

We must now see by what a chain of circumstances he had arrived at his
present position. About the year 1660, Sainte-Croix, while in the army,
had made the acq