between Falaise and Glatigny at one stretch, and returned without taking breath, with Lanoe, who put him up behind him on his horse.  They had scarcely arrived when Mme. de Combray ordered Lanoe to get a carriage at Donnay and prepare for a journey of several days.  Lanoe objected a little, said it was harvest time, and that he had important work to finish, but all that mattered little to the Marquise, who was firm and expected to be obeyed.  Mme. Acquet also insisted saying, “You know that mama only feels safe when you drive her and that you are always well paid for it.”  This decided Lanoe who started for Bijude where he slept that night.  Mme. de Combray did not spare her servants, and distance was not such an obstacle to those people, accustomed to marching and riding, as it is nowadays.  This fact will help to explain some of the incidents that are to follow.

On Thursday, July 16th, Lanoe returned to Falaise with a little cart that a peasant of Donnay had lent him, to which he had harnessed his horse and another lent him by Desjardins, one of Mme. de Combray’s farmers.  The two women got in and started for La Bijude, Lefebre accompanying them to the suburbs.  He arranged a meeting with them at Caen two days later, and gave them a little plan he had drawn which would enable them to avoid the more frequented highroad.

Mme. de Combray and her daughter slept that night at La Bijude.  The next day was spent in arguing with the Buquets who did not dare to resist the Marquise’s commands, and at night they delivered, against their will, two sacks containing 9,000 francs in crowns which she caused to be placed in the cart, which was housed in the barn.  It was impossible to take more the first time, and Mme. Acquet rejoiced, hoping that the rest of the sum would remain at her disposal.  The Marquise had judged it prudent to send Lanoe away to the fair at Saint-Clair which was held in the open country about a league away, and they only saw him again at the time fixed for their departure on Saturday.  He has left an account of the journey, which though evidently written in a bad temper, is rather picturesque.

“I returned from the fair,” he says, “towards one o’clock in the afternoon, and while I was harnessing the horses I saw a valise and night bag in the carriage.  Colin, the servant at La Bijude, threw two bundles of straw in the carriage for the ladies to sit on, and Mme. de Combray gave me a portmanteau, a package which seemed to contain linen, and an umbrella to put in the carriage.  On the road I made the horses trot, but Mme. Acquet told me not to go so fast because they didn’t want to arrive at Caen before evening, seeing that they had stolen money in the carriage.  I looked at her, but said nothing, but I said to myself:  ’This is another of her tricks; if I had known this before we started I would have left them behind; she used deceit to compromise me, not being able to