After such an event the Council could be only a formality. The king, the young queen, the Grand-master, and the cardinal returned to it, taking with them the vanquished Catherine, who said no word except to approve the measures proposed by the Guises. In spite of a slight opposition from the Chancelier Olivier (the only person present who said one word that expressed the independence to which his office bound him), the Duc de Guise was appointed lieutenant-general of the kingdom. Robertet brought the required documents, showing a devotion which might be called collusion. The king, giving his arm to his mother, recrossed the _salle des gardes_, announcing to the court as he passed along that on the following day he should leave Blois for the chateau of Amboise. The latter residence had been abandoned since the time when Charles VIII. accidentally killed himself by striking his head against the casing of a door on which he had ordered carvings, supposing that he could enter without stooping below the scaffolding. Catherine, to mask the plans of the Guises, remarked aloud that they intended to complete the chateau of Amboise for the Crown at the same time that her own chateau of Chemonceaux was finished. But no one was the dupe of that pretext, and all present awaited great events. After spending about two hours endeavoring to see where he was in the obscurity of the dungeon, Christophe ended by discovering that the place was sheathed in rough woodwork, thick enough to make the square hole into which he was put both healthy and habitable. The door, like that of a pig-pen, was so low that he stooped almost double on entering it. Beside this door was a heavy iron grating, opening upon a sort of corridor, which gave a little light and a little air. This arrangement, in all respects like that of the dungeons of Venice, showed plainly that the architecture of the chateau of Blois belonged to the Venetian school, which during the Middle Ages, sent so many builders into all parts of Europe. By tapping this species of pit above the woodwork Christophe discovered that the walls which separated his cell to right and left from the adjoining ones were made of brick. Striking one of them to get an idea of its thickness, he was somewhat surprised to hear return blows given on the other side. “Who are you?” said his neighbor, speaking to him through the corridor. “I am Christophe Lecamus.” “I,” replied the voice, “am Captain Chaudieu, brother of the minister. I was taken prisoner to-night at Beaugency; but, luckily, there is nothing against me.” “All is discovered,” said Christophe; “you are fortunate to be saved from the fray.” “We have three thousand men at this moment in the forests of the Vendomois, all determined men, who mean to abduct the king and the queen-mother during their journey. Happily La Renaudie was cleverer than I; he managed to escape. You had only just left us when the Guise men surprised us--” “But I don’t know La Renaudie.”