Left to herself, Bertrande felt utterly worn out by so much emotion; indignation gave way to depression.  She began to realise what she had done, and the scandal which would fall on her own head.  Just then her baby awoke, and held out its arms, smiling, and calling for its father.  Its father, was he not a criminal?  Yes! but was it for her to ruin him, to invoke the law, to send him to death, after having taken him to her heart, to deliver him to infamy which would recoil on her own head and her child’s and on the infant which was yet unborn?  If he had sinned before God, was it not for God to punish him?  If against herself, ought she not rather to overwhelm him with contempt?  But to invoke the help, of strangers to expiate this offence; to lay bare the troubles of her life, to unveil the sanctuary of the nuptial couch—­in short, to summon the whole world to behold this fatal scandal, was not that what in her imprudent anger she had really done?  She repented bitterly of her haste, she sought to avert the consequences, and notwithstanding the night and the bad weather, she hurried at once to Pierre’s dwelling, hoping at all costs to withdraw her denunciation.  He was not there:  he had at once taken a horse and started for Rieux.  Her accusation was already on its way to the magistrates!

At break of day the house where Martin Guerre lodged when at Rieux was surrounded by soldiers.  He came forward with confidence and inquired what was wanted.  On hearing the accusation, he changed colour slightly, then collected himself, and made no resistance.  When he came before the judge, Bertrande’s petition was read to him, declaring him to be “an impostor, who falsely, audaciously, and treacherously had deceived her by taking the name and assuming the person of Martin Guerre,” and demanding that he should be required to entreat pardon from God, the king, and herself.

The prisoner listened calmly to the charge, and met it courageously, only evincing profound surprise at such a step being taken by a wife who had lived with him for two years since his return, and who only now thought of disputing the rights he had so long enjoyed.  As he was ignorant both of Bertrande’s suspicions and their confirmation, and also of the jealousy which had inspired her accusation, his astonishment was perfectly natural, and did not at all appear to be assumed.  He attributed the whole charge to the machinations of his uncle, Pierre Guerre; an old man, he said, who, being governed entirely by avarice and the desire of revenge, now disputed his name and rights, in order the better to deprive him of his property, which might be worth from sixteen to eighteen hundred livres.  In order to attain his end, this wicked man had not hesitated to pervert his wife’s mind, and at the risk of her own dishonour had instigated this calumnious charge—­a horrible and unheard-of thing in the mouth of a lawful wife.  “Ah!  I do not blame her,” he cried; “she must suffer more than I do, if she really entertains doubts such as these; but I deplore her readiness to listen to these extraordinary calumnies originated by my enemy.”