‘I am—­I am that wretch.  Oh, would that M. le Baron could know!’

‘My dear, faithful foster-brother!  They deceived me,’ cried Berenger, in great agitation, as an absolute howl came from the other side of the wall:  ’M. le Baron come to this!  Woe worth the day!’ and Berenger with difficulty mitigated his affectionate servant’s lamentations enough to learn from him how he had been seized almost at the gates of Bellaise, closely interrogated, deprived of the letter to Madame la Baronne, and thrown into this dungeon.  The Chevalier.  Not an unmerciful man, according to the time, had probably meant to release him as soon as the marriage between his son and niece should have rendered it superfluous to detain this witness to Berenger’s existence.  There, then, the poor fellow had lain for three years, and his work during this weary time had been the scraping with a potsherd at the stone of his wall, and his pertinacious perseverance had succeeded in forming a hole just large enough to enable him to see the light of the torch carried by the gentlemen.  On his side, he said, there was nothing but a strong iron door, and a heavily-barred window, looking, like that in the passage, into the fosse within the walled garden; but, on the other hand, if he could enlarge his hole sufficiently to creep through it, he could escape with them in case of their finding a subterranean outlet.  The opening within his cell was, of course, much larger than the very small space he had made by loosening a stone towards the passage, but he was obliged always to build up each side of his burrow at the hours of his jailer’s visit, lest his work should be detected, and to stamp the rubbish into his floor.  But while they talked, Humfrey and Philip, with their knives, scraped so diligently that two more stones could be displaced; and, looking down the widening hole through the prodigious mass of wall, they could see a ghastly, ragged, long-bearded scarecrow, with an almost piteous expression of joy on his face, at once again seeing familiar faces.  And when, at his earnest entreaty, Berenger stood so as to allow his countenance to be as visible as the torch could make it through the ‘wall’s-hole,’ the vault echoed with the poor fellow’s delighted cry.  ’I am happy!  M. le Baron is himself again.  The assassin’s cruel work is gone!  Ah! thanks to the saints!  Blessed be St. Lucie, it was not in vain that I entreated her!’

The torches were, however, waxing so low that the sight could not long be afforded poor Osbert; and, with a promise to return to him next day, the party returned to the upper air, where they warmed themselves over the fire, and held council over measures for the present relief of the captive.  Berenger grieved that he had given him up so entirely for lost as to have made no exertions on his behalf, and declared his resolution of entreating that he might be allowed to enjoy comparative comfort with them in the keep.  It was a risk, but the Chevalier might fairly suppose