However, he cared very little about it. It had been tacitly decreed that the robbery at Quesnay should be judged by a special court at Rouen. Licquet became the organiser and stage-manager of the proceedings. At the end of 1807 he had under lock and key thirty-eight prisoners whom he questioned incessantly, and kept in a state of uncertainty as to whether he meant to confront them with each other. But he declared himself dissatisfied. D'Ache's absence spoiled his joy. He quite understood that without the latter, his triumph would be incomplete, his work would remain unfinished, and it was doubtless due to this torturing obsession that he owed the idea, as cruel as it was ingenious, of a new drama of which the old Marquise de Combray was again the victim. On a certain day of November, 1807, she heard from her cell an unusual tumult in the passages of the prison. Doors burst open and people called to each other. There were cries of joy, whispers, exclamations of astonishment or vexation, then long silences, which left the prisoner perplexed. The next day when Licquet came to visit her she noticed that his face wore a troubled expression. He was very laconic, mentioned grave events which were preparing, and disappeared like a busy man. To prisoners everything is a reason for hope, and that night Mme. de Combray gave free course to her illusions. The following day she received through the woman Delaitre, a short letter from the honest "Captain"--the man who had saved Mme. Acquet, killed the yellow horse, and whom she called her guardian angel. The guardian angel wrote only a few words: "Bonaparte is overthrown; the King is about to land in France; the prisons are opening everywhere. Write a letter at once to M. d'Ache which he can hand to his Majesty. I will undertake to forward it to him." It is a truly touching fact that the old Marquise, whose energy no fatigue, no moral torture could abate, fainted from happiness on learning of her King's return. The event realised all her hopes. For so many years she had been expecting it from one moment to another, without ever growing discouraged, that a denouement for which she had been prepared so long, seemed quite natural to her, and she immediately made her arrangements for the new life that was about to commence. She first of all wrote a line of thanks to the "good Delaitre," promising her protection and assuring him that he should be rewarded for his devotion. She then wrote to d'Ache a letter overflowing with joy.