But Louise was gone. The moment Lebat had looked round in search of assistance Marie had whispered in Louise's ear: "Fly, Louise, for the sake of the children; if you are arrested they are lost!" Had she herself been alone concerned, the old woman would have stood by Marie and shared her fate; but the words "for the sake of the children" decided her, and she had instantly slipped away among the crowd, whose attention had been called by Lebat's first words, and dived into a small shop, where she at once began to bargain for some eggs. "Where is the woman?" Lebat repeated angrily. "What is she like?" one of the bystanders asked. But Lebat could give no description whatever of her. He had noticed that Marie was speaking to some one when he first caught sight of her face; but he had noticed nothing more, and did not know whether the woman was young or old. "I can't tell you," he said in a tone of vexation. "Never mind; we shall find her later on. This capture is the most important." So saying he set out, with Marie walking beside him, with a guard on either hand. In the next street he came on a party of four of the armed soldiers of the Commune, and ordered them to take the place of those he had first charged with the duty, and directed them to proceed with him to the Maine. Marie was taken at once before the committee sitting en permanence for the discovery and arrest of suspects. "I charge this young woman with being an aristocrat in disguise. She is the daughter of the ci-devant Marquis de St. Caux, who was executed on the 2d of September at Bicetre." "Murdered, you mean, sir," Marie said in a clear haughty voice. "Why not call things by their proper name?" "I am sorry," Lebat went on, not heeding the interruption, "that it should fall to my lot to denounce her, for I acknowledge that in the days before our glorious Revolution commenced I have visited at her father's chateau. But I feel that my duty to the republic stands before any private considerations." "You have done perfectly right," the president of the committee said. "As I understand that the accused does not deny that she is the daughter of the ci-devant marquis, I will at once sign the order for her committal to La Force. There is room there still, though the prisons are filling up again fast." "We must have another jail delivery," one of the committee laughed brutally; and a murmur of assent passed through the chamber. The order was made out, and Marie was handed over to the armed guard, to be taken with the next batch of prisoners to La Force.