The cabaret was absolutely deserted; one might have walked all about and carried off what he pleased, as from the sleeping palace in the tale.  “This is a pretty way to keep an inn,” I thought.  “Where have all the lazy rascals got to?” Then I heard a confused murmur of voices and shuffle of feet from the back, and I went through into the passage where the staircase was.

Here were gathered, in a huddle, like scared sheep, some dozen of the serving-folk, men and maids, the lasses most of them in tears, the men looking scarce less terrified.  Their gaze was fixed on the closed door of Maitre Menard’s little counting-room, whence issued the shrill cry: 

“Spare me, noble gentlemen!  Spare a poor innkeeper!  I swear I know nothing of his whereabouts.”

As my footsteps sounded on the threshold, one and all spun round to look at me in fresh dread.

“Mon dieu, it is his lackey!” a chambermaid cried.  In the next second a little wiry dame, her eyes blazing with fury, darted out of the group and seized me by the arm with a grip of her nails that made me think a panther had got me.

“So here you are,” she screamed.  I declare I thought she was going to bite me.  “Oh-h-h, you and your fine master, that come here and devour our substance and never pay one sou, but bring ruin to the house!  Now, go you straight in there and let them squeeze your throat awhile, and see how you like it yourself!”

She swept me across the passage like a whirlwind, opened the door, shoved me in, and banged it after me before I could collect my senses.

The room was small; it was very well filled up by a bureau, a strong box, a table, two chairs, three soldiers, one innkeeper, and myself.

The bureau stood by the window, with Maitre Menard’s account-books on it.  Opposite was the table, with a captain of dragoons on it.  Of his two men, one took the middle of the room, amusing himself with the windpipe of Maitre Menard; the other was posted at the door.  I was shot out of Mme. Menard’s grasp into his, and I found his the gentler of the two.

“I say I know not where he went,” Maitre Menard was gasping, black in the face from the dragoon’s attentions.  “He did not tell—­I have no notion.  Ah—­” The breath failed him utterly, but his eyes, bloodshot and bulging, rolled toward me.

“What now?” the captain cried, springing to his feet.  “Who are you?”

He wore under his breastplate what I took to be the uniform of the city guards.  I had seen the like on the officer of the gate the night I entered Paris.  He was a young man of a decidedly bourgeois appearance, as if he were not much, outside of his uniform.

“My name is Felix Broux,” I said.  “I came to pay a bill—­”

“His servant,” Maitre Menard contrived to murmur, the dragoon allowing him a breath.

“Oh, you are the Comte de Mar’s servant, are you?  Where have you left your master?”