Remembering the nature of my last visit with Mazarin to this house, I placed small faith in Martin's remarks, but as it was clearly impossible to obtain any further information I took my leave, resolving to discover for myself what really had become of Henri. Raoul joined me in the search, but for a long time our efforts were fruitless. It became, indeed, difficult not to believe in my cousin's death. Many even of Conde's friends accepted the report as true, while the Abbe's henchmen openly mourned the loss of their brilliant leader. Still I was not entirely satisfied, especially as no trace could be found of Pillot. During one of our expeditions we came across Pierre and Francois, the one grim and hostile, the other smiling and communicative. "Monsieur is right," replied Francois in answer to my questioning, "M. de Lalande did leave the astrologer's house; I helped to carry him. He was ill--dying, I think. We took him to a safe place. Pillot stayed to nurse him and I left them. He instructed me to go because the soldiers were watching." "Could you show us this house?" I asked. "Monsieur would have his journey in vain. M. de Lalande is not there now. Pillot took him, or his dead body, away in a carriage." "Where is Pillot now?" "Ah! monsieur asks a question! Perhaps he is dead too! I have not seen him since." For a moderate consideration Francois agreed to point out the haunts which his former ally had been in the habit of frequenting. Such dens of vice and misery, where crime, starvation, and disease went hand in hand, I had never beheld. I wondered how any one could live in such noisome places even for a day. The sufferings of the people were terrible; a dreadful pestilence mowed them down in scores. Small marvel that a clever agitator like De Retz could obtain hundreds of willing tools ready for any act of bloodshed and violence. Always hungry, always in filth and rags, scarred and disfigured by disease, their numbers decimated many times over by an ever-present plague, what could they know of the sanctity of life? Death walked and talked with them continually; a familiar guest, eating and drinking by their side like a trusty comrade--feared by none, welcomed by many. But for Francois we should never have left these dens alive. With all our care and trouble we could obtain no information. My cousin had vanished so completely that I gradually became convinced of his death, and an accidental meeting with De Retz confirmed me in this belief. Coming one day from the neighbourhood of Notre Dame, I met the Abbe face to face. He stopped involuntarily and his face became white. "De Lalande?" he gasped. "De Lalande? Is it possible?" "Albert de Lalande," I said. "Ah," he exclaimed with a sigh of relief, "Henri's cousin! I had forgotten you, and it is a shock to one's nerves to meet a dead man in the flesh." "Is my cousin really dead, monsieur?" "_Ma foi!_ What a question! Why do you ask?"