It had been the custom for several years, when a person was denounced to the police as an enemy of the government, or a simple malcontent, to have his name put up in Desmarets’ office, and to add to it, in proportion to the denunciations, every bit of information that could help to make a complete portrait of the individual.  That of d’Ache was consulted.  There were found annotations of this sort:  “By reason of his audacity he is one of the most important of the royalists,” “Last December he took a passport at Rouen for Saint-Germain-en-Laye, where he was called by business,” “His host at Saint-Germain, Brandin de Saint-Laurent, declares that he did not sleep there regularly, sometimes two, sometimes three days at a time.”  At last a letter was intercepted addressed to Mme. d’Ache, containing this phrase, which they recognised as Georges’ style:  “Tell M. Durand that things are taking a good turn,... his presence is necessary....  He will have news of me at the Hotel de Bordeaux, rue de Grenelle, Saint-Honore, where he will ask for Houvel.”  Now Houvel was the unknown man who, first of all, had gone to the vine-dresser of Saint-Leu to persuade him to aid the “brigands.”  Thus d’Ache’s route was traced from Biville to Paris and the conclusion drawn that, knowing all the country about Bray, where he owned estates, he had been chosen to arrange the itinerary of the conspirators and to organise their journeys.  He had accompanied them from La Poterie to Feuquieres, sometimes going before them, sometimes staying with them in the farms where he had found for them places of refuge.

In default of Georges, then, d’Ache was the next best person to seize, and the First Consul appreciated this fact so keenly that he organised two brigades of picked soldiers and fifty dragoons.  But they only served to escort poor sick Mme. d’Ache, her daughter Louise and their friend Caqueray, who were immediately locked up—­the last named in the Tower of the Temple, and the two women in the Madelonnettes.  The infirm old grandmother remained at Saint-Clair, while Alexandrine wished to follow her mother and sister, and was left quite at liberty.  But d’Ache could not be found.  Manginot’s army had searched the whole country, from Beauvais to Treport, without success; they had sought him at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, where he was said to be hidden, at Saint-Denis-de-Monts, at Saint-Romain, at Rouen.  The prefects of Eure and Seine-Inferieure were ordered to set all their police on his track.  The result of this campaign was pitiable, and they only succeeded in arresting d’Ache’s younger brother, an inoffensive fellow of feeble mind, appropriately named “Placide,” who was nicknamed “Tourlour,” on account of his lack of wit and his rotundity.  His greatest fear was of being mistaken for his brother, which frequently happened.  As the elder d’Ache could never be caught, Placide, who loved tranquillity and hardly ever went away from home, was invariably