Combray family; France -- History -- Consulate and First Empire, 1799-1815
This occurrence alarmed M. de Montfiquet, and he persuaded his guest to
leave Mandeville for a time. During the following night they both
started on foot for Rubercy, where M. Gilbert de Mondejen, a great
friend and confidant of d'Ache's, was living in hiding from the police
in the house of a Demoiselle Genneville. This old lady, who was an
ardent royalist, welcomed the fugitives warmly; they were scarcely
seated at breakfast, however, when a servant gave the alarm. "Here come
the soldiers!" she cried.
D'Ache and Mondejen rushed from the room and bounded across the porch
into the courtyard just as the gendarmes burst in at the gate. They
would have been caught if a horse had not slipped on the wet pavement
and caused some confusion, during which they shut themselves into a
barn, escaped by a door at the back, and jumping over hedges and ditches
gained a little wood on the further side of the Tortoue brook.
But d'Ache had been seen, and from that day he was obliged to resume his
wandering existence, living in the woods by day and tramping by night.
He was entirely without resources, for he had no money, but was certain
of finding a refuge, in case of need, in this region where malcontents
abounded and all doors opened to them. In this way he reached the forest
of Serisy, a part of which had formerly belonged to the Montfiquets; it
was here that the abandoned mines were situated that had been mentioned
to Licquet as Allain's place of refuge. Though obliged to abandon the
Chateau de Mandeville, where, as well as at Rubercy, the gendarmes had
made a search, d'Ache did not lack shelter around Bayeux. A Madame
Chivre, who lived on the outskirts of the town, had for fifteen years
been the providence of the most desperate Chouans, and d'Ache was sure
of a welcome from her; but he stayed only a few days.
Mme. Amfrye also assisted him. This woman who never went out except to
church, and was seen every morning with eyes downcast, walking to
Saint-Patrice with her servant carrying her prayer book, was one of the
fiercest royalists of the region. She looked after the emigrants' funds
and took charge of their correspondence. Once a week a priest rang her
door-bell; it was the Abbe Nicholas, cure of Vierville, a little fishing
village. The Abbe, whose charity was proverbial, and accounted for his
visits to Mme. Amfrye, was in reality a second David l'Intrepide; mass
said and his beads told, he got into a boat and went alone to the
islands of Saint-Marcouf, where an exchange of letters was made with the
English emissaries, the good priest bringing his packet back to Bayeux
under his soutane.
D'Ache could also hide with Mademoiselle Dumesnil, or Mlle. Duquesnay de
Montfiquet, to both of whom he had been presented by Mme. de Vaubadon,
an ardent royalist who had rendered signal service to the party during
the worst days of the Terror. She was mentioned among the Normans who
had shown most intelligent and devoted zeal for the cause.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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