Estang at all. It is as easy
to kill two messengers as one, and the first was killed."

"But how would he know what was in the letter? It had not been opened."

"I had not thought of that," said Jacques. "It drives me back on my
first suspicion, which monsieur does not like. But, unless L'Estang
helped in the plot, I cannot understand how it was carried out!"

We sat talking half the night, but without coming any nearer to solving
the problem, and at last, thoroughly tired, I went to bed. Out of the
whole tangle one thing only was plain--Etienne Cordel was playing a
desperate game, and no scruples would prevent him from winning it.

And there was no way of getting at the rascal! He laid his plots with so
much skill that I could accuse him of nothing. I had no real proofs
against him, and without proofs he could laugh in my face.

The story of the attempt on my life quickly spread abroad, and the
villagers came in a crowd to learn if I had been injured.

"Who are the villains, monsieur?" cried Urie. "Tell us who they are, and
we will make an end of them."

"Ay," said another; "we will pull them in pieces!" and his companions
shouted their approval.

"No," I exclaimed, "you must do nothing against the law, or you will be
made to suffer for it. Two of the rascals are dead, and the others are
not likely to trouble me again. But there is no harm in keeping watch on
any strangers hanging about the neighbourhood."

"We will do that, monsieur!" they cried, and at last I succeeded in
persuading them to return to their homes.

The excitement, however, did not die down, and the next evening Jacques
informed me there was a fierce talk going on at old Pierre's. Some one
had started the report that my enemy was Etienne Cordel, and a cry had
been raised to march to his house and burn it about his ears.

"But they do not mean it?" I exclaimed.

"As far as words go, they do," replied Jacques; "but dogs that are so
ready to bark rarely bite."

He treated the subject so lightly that I thought no more of it; but
about ten o'clock a woman came from the village with the news that a
number of the men, armed with clubs, pikes and forks, had started off in
a body for the lawyer's house. In answer to my anxious questioning she
said they had been gone some time, and had taken a short cut across
country.

"Saddle the horses, Jacques!" I cried; "this must be stopped. Cordel has
influence enough to have every one of them broken on th