While he was trying to make me stand, I suddenly gathered all my energy into my right arm and gave him a quick blow in the pit of the stomach. With a fearful howl, he let me go and fell upon his knees. A blow in the face then made him drop as limp as I had pretended to be; and I resumed my flight, this time at a more leisurely pace. And now all my physical powers seemed to be leaving me. Pains racked my head, and I seemed at one time to freeze and burn all over, at another time to freeze in one part and burn in another. I ached in my muscles, my bones, my stomach. At every step, I felt that it was vastly difficult to take another, that it would be ineffably sweet to sink down upon the earth and rest. Yet I knew that one taste of that sweetness meant death, and I was determined not to lose a life that had been saved from so great peril by so great effort. Despite all the soldiers at their command, the King of France and the Duke of Guise should not have their will with me. At last,--I know not how far from Paris,--I came to an inn. There were still a few crowns in my pocket. Forgetting the danger from which I had fled, not thinking that it might overtake me here, feeling only the need of immediate shelter and rest, I pounded on the door until I got admittance. I have never had any but the vaguest recollection of my installation at that inn, so near to insensibility I was when I fell against its door. I have a dim memory of having exchanged a few words with a sleepy, stolid host; of being glad of the darkness of the night, for it prevented him from noticing my wet, frozen, begrimed, bedraggled, half-dead condition; of my bargaining for the sole occupancy of a room; of his leading me up a winding stairway to a chamber; of my plunging from the threshold to the bed as soon as the door was opened. I slept for several hours. When I awoke, it was about noon, and I was very hungry and thirsty. My clothes had dried upon me, and I essayed to put them into a fairly presentable condition. I found within my doublet the four letters, which had been first soaked and then stiffened. The now useless one addressed to the Abbot Foulon, I destroyed; then I went down to the kitchen, and saw, with relief, that it was empty. I ate and drank hurriedly but ravenously. Again the fear of capture, the impulse to put Paris further and further behind, awoke in me. I bought a peasant's cap from the landlord, telling him that the wind had blown my hat into the river the previous night, and set forth. It was my intention to walk to La Tournoire, that my money might last. Afoot I could the better turn from the road and conceal myself in woods or fields, at any intimation of pursuit. At La Tournoire, I would newly equip myself with clothes, weapons, horse, and money; and thence I would ride to Angers, and finally away, southward, to Nerac.