A sound of firing interrupted him; the soldiers of the Duc de Sairmeuse were approaching.

“Good God!” exclaimed Chanlouineau, “and Marie-Anne!”

They rushed in pursuit of her, and Maurice was the first to discover her, standing in the centre of the open space clinging to the neck of her father’s horse.  He took her in his arms, trying to drag her away.

“Come!” said he, “come!”

But she refused.

“Leave me, leave me!” she entreated.

“But all is lost!”

“Yes, I know that all is lost—­even honor.  Leave me here.  I must remain; I must die, and thus hide my shame.  I must, it shall be so!”

Just then Chanlouineau appeared.

Had he divined the secret of her resistance?  Perhaps; but without uttering a word, he lifted her in his strong arms as if she had been a child and bore her to the carriage guarded by Abbe Midon.

“Get in,” he said, addressing the priest, “and quick—­take Mademoiselle Lacheneur.  Now, Maurice, in your turn!”

But already the duke’s soldiers were masters of the field.  Seeing a group in the shadow, at a little distance, they rushed to the spot.

The heroic Chanlouineau seized his gun, and brandishing it like a club, held the enemy at bay, giving Maurice time to spring into the carriage, catch the reins and start the horse off at a gallop.

All the cowardice and all the heroism displayed on that terrible night will never be really known.

Two minutes after the departure of Marie-Anne and of Maurice, Chanlouineau was still battling with the foe.

A dozen or more soldiers were in front of him.  Twenty shots had been fired, but not a ball had struck him.  His enemies always believed him invulnerable.

“Surrender!” cried the soldiers, amazed by such valor; “surrender!”

“Never! never!”

He was truly formidable; he brought to the support of his marvellous courage a superhuman strength and agility.  No one dared come within reach of those brawny arms that revolved with the power and velocity of the sails of a wind-mill.

Then it was that a soldier, confiding his musket to the care of a companion, threw himself flat upon his belly, and crawling unobserved around behind this obscure hero, seized him by the legs.  He tottered like an oak beneath the blow of the axe, struggled furiously, but taken at such a disadvantage was thrown to the ground, crying, as he fell: 

“Help! friends, help!”

But no one responded to this appeal.

At the other end of the open space those upon whom he called had, after a desperate struggle, yielded.

The main body of the duke’s infantry was near at hand.

The rebels heard the drums beating the charge; they could see the bayonets gleaming in the sunlight.

Lacheneur, who had remained in the same spot, utterly ignoring the shot that whistled around him, felt that his few remaining comrades were about to be exterminated.