On the evening of the seventeenth of April the abbe was seated in the loft reading a newspaper to the baron when suddenly the door was quietly opened, and one of the Poignot boys looked into the room. He did not speak, however, but merely gave the cure a glance, and then quickly withdrew. The priest finished the paragraph he was perusing, laid down the paper, and went out on to the landing. “What’s the matter?” he inquired. “Ah!” answered the young fellow, “M. Maurice, Mademoiselle Lacheneur, and the old corporal have just arrived; they want to come upstairs.” Three bounds and the abbe reached the ground floor. “You imprudent children!” he exclaimed, addressing the three travellers, “what has induced you to return here?” Then turning to Maurice: “Isn’t it enough that your father has nearly died for you and through you? Are you so anxious for his recapture, that you return here to set our enemies on his track? Be off at once!” Utterly abashed, it was as much as Maurice could do to falter his excuses; uncertainty, he said, had seemed worse to him than death; he had heard of M. Lacheneur’s execution; he had started off at once without reflection and only asked to see his father and embrace his mother before leaving again. The priest was inflexible. “The slightest emotion might kill your father,” he declared; “and I should cause your mother the greatest anxiety if I told her of your return, and the dangers to which you have foolishly exposed yourself. Come, go at once, and cross the frontier again this very night.” The scene had been witnessed by Jean Lacheneur, who now approached. “The time has come for me to take _my_ leave,” said he, “I shall go with Maurice. But I scarcely think that the highway’s the right place for my sister. You would cap all your kindness, Monsieur le Cure, if you would only persuade Father Poignot to let her remain here, and if you would watch over her yourself.” The abbe deliberated for a moment, and then hurriedly replied: “So be it; but go at once; your name is not on the proscribed list. You will not be pursued.” Suddenly separated from his wife in this fashion, Maurice wished to confer with her, to give her some parting advice; but the abbe did not allow him an opportunity to do so. “Go, go at once,” he insisted. “Farewell!”