“Let us understand one another, my good M. Chambertin,” he said coolly.  “Those unfortunate Clamettes, as you say, are too helpless and too numerous to smuggle across Paris with any chance of success.  Therefore I look to you to take them under your protection.  They are all stowed away comfortably at this moment in a conveyance which I have provided for them.  That conveyance is waiting at the bridgehead now.  We could not cross without your help; we could not get across Paris without your august presence and your tricolour scarf of office.  So you are coming with us, my dear M. Chambertin,” he continued, and, with force which was quite irresistible, he began to drag his enemy after him towards the door.  “You are going to sit in that conveyance with the Clamettes, and I myself will have the honour to drive you.  And at every bridgehead you will show your pleasing countenance and your scarf of office to the guard and demand free passage for yourself and your family, as a representative member of the Committee of Public Safety.  And then we’ll enter Paris by the Porte d’Ivry and leave it by the Batignolles; and everywhere your charming presence will lull the guards’ suspicions to rest.  I pray you, come!  There is no time to consider!  At noon to-morrow, without a moment’s grace, my friend Sir Andrew Ffoulkes, who has the papers in his possession, will dispose of them as he thinks best unless I myself do claim them from him.”

While he spoke he continued to drag his enemy along with him, with an assurance and an impudence which were past belief.  Chauvelin was trying to collect his thoughts; a whirl of conflicting plans were running riot in his mind.  The Scarlet Pimpernel in his power!  At any point on the road he could deliver him up to the nearest guard...then still hold the Clamettes and demand the papers....

“Too late, my dear Monsieur Chambertin!” Sir Percy’s mocking voice broke in, as if divining his thoughts.  “You do not know where to find my friend Ffoulkes, and at noon to-morrow, if I do not arrive to claim those papers, there will not be a single ragamuffin in Paris who will not be crying your shame and that of your precious colleagues upon the housetops.”

Chauvelin’s whole nervous system was writhing with the feeling of impotence.  Mechanically, unresisting now, he followed his enemy down the main staircase of the chateau and out through the wide open gates.  He could not bring himself to believe that he had been so completely foiled, that this impudent adventurer had him once more in the hollow of his hand.

“In the name of Satan, bring us back those papers!” Robespierre had commanded.  And now he—­Chauvelin—­was left in a maze of doubt; and the vital alternative was hammering in his brain:  “The Scarlet Pimpernel—­or those papers—–­” Which, in Satan’s name, was the more important?  Passion whispered “The Scarlet Pimpernel!” but common sense and the future of his party, the whole future of the Revolution mayhap, demanded those compromising papers.  And all the while he followed that relentless enemy through the avenues of the park and down the lonely lane.  Overhead the trees of the forest of Sucy, nodding in a gentle breeze, seemed to mock his perplexity.