Unable to resist his intense curiosity, M. d’Escorval was on the point of rapping on the wall to question him, when the door of the room occupied by this man, whom the baron already called his saviour, was impetuously thrown open.

Another man entered, whose face was also outside the baron’s range of vision; and the new-comer, in a tone of astonishment, exclaimed: 

“Good heavens! what are you doing?”

The baron drew back in despair.

“All is discovered!” he thought.

The man whom M. d’Escorval believed to be his friend did not pause in his labor of unwinding the rope, and it was in the most tranquil voice that he responded: 

“As you see, I am freeing myself from this burden of rope, which I find extremely uncomfortable.  There are at least sixty yards of it, I should think—­and what a bundle it makes!  I feared they would discover it under my cloak.”

“And what are you going to do with all this rope?” inquired the new-comer.

“I am going to hand it to Baron d’Escorval, to whom I have already given a file.  He must make his escape to-night.”

So improbable was this scene that the baron could not believe his own ears.

“I cannot be awake; I must be dreaming,” he thought.

The new-comer uttered a terrible oath, and, in an almost threatening tone, he said: 

“We will see about that!  If you have gone mad, I, thank God! still possess my reason!  I will not permit——­”

“Pardon!” interrupted the other, coldly, “you will permit it.  This is merely the result of your own—­credulity.  When Chanlouineau asked you to allow him to receive a visit from Mademoiselle Lacheneur, that was the time you should have said:  ‘I will not permit it.’  Do you know what the fellow desired?  Simply to give Mademoiselle Lacheneur a letter of mine, so compromising in its natures that if it ever reaches the hands of a certain person of my acquaintance, my father and I will be obliged to reside in London in future.  Then farewell to the projects for an alliance between our two families!”

The new-comer heaved a mighty sigh, accompanied by a half-angry, half-sorrowful exclamation; but the other, without giving him any opportunity to reply, resumed: 

“You, yourself, Marquis, would doubtless be compromised.  Were you not a chamberlain during the reign of Bonaparte?  Ah, Marquis! how could a man of your experience, a man so subtle, and penetrating, and acute, allow himself to be duped by a low, ignorant peasant?”

Now M. d’Escorval understood.  He was not dreaming; it was the Marquis de Courtornieu and Martial de Sairmeuse who were talking on the other side of the wall.

This poor M. de Courtornieu had been so entirely crushed by Martial’s revelation that he no longer made any effort to oppose him.

“And this terrible letter?” he groaned.

“Marie-Anne Lacheneur gave it to Abbe Midon, who came to me and said:  ’Either the baron will escape, or this letter will be taken to the Duc de Richelieu.’  I voted for the baron’s escape, I assure you.  The abbe procured all that was necessary; he met me at a rendezvous which I appointed in a quiet spot; he coiled all his rope about my body, and here I am.”