"They went these three hours back," the woman answered, staring at me. "And I could have sworn that Monsieur went with them! But, to be sure, it was only just light, and a mistake is soon made." A thought that should have occurred to me before--a horrible thought--darted its sting into my heart. I plunged my hand into the inner pocket of my coat, and drew it out empty. The commission--the commission to which I had trusted was gone! I uttered a cry of rage and glared round me. "What is it?" said the sour man, meeting my eyes. "My papers!" I answered, almost gnashing my teeth, as I thought how I had been tricked and treated. I saw it all now. "My papers!" "Well?" he said. "They are gone! I have been robbed of them!" "Indeed!" he said drily. "That remains to be proved, Monsieur." I thought that he meant that I might be mistaken, as I had been mistaken before; and, to make certain, I turned out the pocket. "No," he said, as drily as before. "I see that they are not there. But the point is, Monsieur, were they ever there?" I looked at him. "Yes," he said, "that is the point, Monsieur. Where are your papers?" "I tell you I have been robbed of them!" I cried, in a rage. "And I say, that remains to be proved," he answered. "And until it is proved, you do not leave here. That is all, Monsieur, and it is simple." "And who," I said indignantly, "are you, I should like to know, Monsieur, who stop travellers on the highway, and ask for papers?" "Merely the President of the Local Committee," he replied. "And do you suppose," I said, fuming at his folly, "that I bound my hands, and stifled myself under that hay, on purpose? On purpose to pass through your wretched village?" "I suppose nothing, Monsieur," he answered coolly. "But this is the road to Turin, where M. d'Artois is said to be collecting the disaffected; and to Nîmes, where mischievous persons are flaunting the red cockade. And without papers, no one passes." "But what will you do with me?" I asked, seeing that the clowns, who gaped round us, regarded him as nothing less than a Solomon. "Detain you, M. le Vicomte, until you procure papers," he answered. "But, _mon Dieu!_" I said. "That is not so easily done here. Who is likely to know me?" He shrugged his shoulders. "Monsieur does not leave without the papers," he said. "That is all." And he spoke truly, that was all. In vain I laid the facts before him, and asked if any one would voluntarily suffer, merely to hide his lack of papers, what I had undergone; in vain I asked if the state in which I had been found was not itself proof that I had been robbed; if a man could tie his own hands, and pile hay on himself. In vain even that I said I knew who had robbed me; the last statement only made matters worse. "Indeed!" he said ironically. "Then, pray, who was it?" "The rogue Froment! Froment of Nîmes!" "He is not in this country." "Indeed! I saw him yesterday," I answered.