"Well," answered Pierre, "I will tell you what, Parnac; the officers shall bring him on here, and while we halt to refresh, you and I will have the picking of those saddle-bags of his, in which there are a good thousand crowns besides. If he finds them gone and complains, it will pass for a piece of the archers' handiwork, and no inquiry will be made." "Ay, now thou speakest reason," answered his respectable friend, "and I will send off directly. At the half-way watering place, thou sayest; but at what hour? We must name some hour for the officers to be there." "Say nine o' the clock," answered the groom; "we shall not be there till eleven; but they must wait, you know, they must wait." "Well, it shall be done without delay," replied the host, "but now, hie you in, Pierre, for you say the boy is as sharp as your master, and may suspect us. Yet stay; remember, if you fail me about the bags, I will do for you with your lord. So keep faith." The groom replied at some length, but as their farther conversation seemed likely to refer alone to their private affairs, I made the best of my way back to the house, and ere either groom or landlord returned, had gained sufficient information from my pretty brunette, in regard to the roads, to serve my purpose for the next day. I found that, at the distance of about four miles from the village, the highway was intersected by another, which led away in the very direction I wished to take. It was neglected, however, and heavy, she said, passing through some wide forest ground, which always affords a bad foundation; and since the new road had been made, she added, few people ever travelled the old one except the couriers for St. Malo, who went that way for the purpose of dropping packets, and sometimes sums of money, at various small towns through which it alone passed. It used, she said, to have a bad reputation for robbers, and about three months before, one of the royal messengers had been plundered, but since that time she had heard of no farther outrage.