“Do you still mean to protect him?” asked d’Assas. “More than ever.” “Ah! that’s too much!” muttered a voice. “Why so,” retorted Morgan imperiously, “isn’t it my right as a Companion?” “Certainly,” said two other voices. “Then I use it; both as a Companion and as your leader.” “But suppose in the middle of the fray a stray ball should take him?” said a voice. “Then, it is not a right I claim, nor an order that I give, but an entreaty I make. My friends, promise me, on your honor, that the life of Roland de Montrevel will be sacred to you.” With unanimous voice, all stretching out their hands, they replied: “We swear on our honor!” “Now,” resumed Morgan, “let us look at our position under its true aspect, without deluding ourselves in any way. Once an intelligent police force starts out to pursue us, and makes actual war against us, it will be impossible for us to resist. We may trick them like a fox, or double like a boar, but our resistance will be merely a matter of time, that’s all. At least that is my opinion.” Morgan questioned his companions with his eyes, and their acquiescence was unanimous, though it was with a smile on their lips that they recognized their doom. But that was the way in those strange days. Men went to their death without fear, and they dealt it to others without emotion. “And now,” asked Montbar, “have you anything further to say?” “Yes,” replied Morgan, “I have to add that nothing is easier than to procure horses, or even to escape on foot; we are all hunters and more or less mountaineers. It will take us six hours on horse back to get out of France, or twelve on foot. Once in Switzerland we can snap our fingers at citizen Fouché and his police. That’s all I have to say.” “It would be very amusing to laugh at citizen Fouché,” said Montbar, “but very dull to leave France.” “For that reason, I shall not put this extreme measure to a vote until after we have talked with Cadoudal’s messenger.” “Ah, true,” exclaimed two or three voices; “the Breton! where is the Breton?” “He was asleep when I left,” said Montbar. “And he is still sleeping,” said Adler, pointing to a man lying on a heap of straw in a recess of the grotto. They wakened the Breton, who rose to his knees, rubbing his eyes with one hand and feeling for his carbine with the other. “You are with friends,” said a voice; “don’t be afraid.” “Afraid!” said the Breton; “who are you, over there, who thinks I am afraid?” “Some one who probably does not know what fear is, my dear Branche-d’Or,” said Morgan, who recognized in Cadoudal’s messenger the same man whom they had received at the Chartreuse the night he himself arrived from Avignon. “I ask pardon on his behalf.”