The chief of that night was spent in enlarging the hole in Osbert’s wall, so as to admit of his creeping through it; and they also prepared their small baggage for departure.  Their stock of money, though some had been spent on renewing their clothes, and some in needful gratuities to the servants and gendarmes, was sufficient for present needs, and they intended to wear their ordinary dress.  They were unlikely to meet any of the peasants in the neighbourhood; and, indeed, Berenger had so constantly ridden out in his black mask, that its absence, now that his scars were gone, was as complete a change as could be effected in one whose height was of unusual.

‘There begins the kneel,’ said Philip, standing at the window.  ’It’s our joy-bell, Berry!  Every clang seems to me to say, “Home! home! home!”

‘For you, Phil,’ said Berenger; ’but I must be satisfied of Eutacie’s fate first.  I shall go first to Nissard—­whither we were bound when we were seized—­then to La Rochelle, whence you may—–­’

‘No more of that,’ burst out Philip.  ’What! would you have me leave you now, after all we have gone through together?  Not that you will find her.  I don’t want to vex you, brother, on such a day as this, but you conjurer’s words are coming true in the other matter.’

‘How?  What mean you, Phil?’

‘What’s the meaning of Aime?’ asked Philip.  ’Even I am French scholar enough for that.  And who sends him?’

Meantime the court was already filling with swarms of persons of every rank and degree, but several anxious hours had passed before the procession was marshaled; and friars and monks, black, white, and gray,—­priests in rich robes and tall caps,—­black-cloaked gentlemen and men-at-arms,—­all bearing huge wax tapers,—­and peasants and beggars of every conceivable aspect,—­filed out of the court, bearing with them the richly-emblazoned bier of the noble and puissant knight, the Beausire Charles Eutache de Ribaumont Nid-de-Merle, his son walking behind in a long black mantle, and all who counted kindred of friendship following two and two; then all the servants, every one who properly belonged to the castle, were counted out by the brothers from their windows, and Guibert among them.

‘Messieurs,’ a low, anxious voice sounded in the room.

‘We will only fetch Osbert.’

It was a terrible only, as precious moments slipped away before there appeared in the lower chamber Berenger and Humfrey, dragging between them a squalid wretch, with a skin like stained parchment over a skeleton, tangled hair and beard, staring bewildered eyes, and fragments of garments, all dust, dirt, and rags.

‘Leave me, leave me, dear master,’ said the object, stretching his whole person towards the fire as they let him sink down before it.  ‘You would but ruin yourself.’

‘It is madness to take him,’ said Aime, impatiently.

‘I go not without him,’ said Berenger.  ‘Give me the soup, Philip.’