These orders followed one another so rapidly that there was a moment's delay in putting them in execution; the carriage was slow to move, the servants were trembling with apprehension, even the horses seemed to hesitate. "Look alive there, ten thousand devils!" shouted Cauvignac; "they are coming! they are coming!" In the distance could be heard the hoof-beats of many horses, approaching rapidly with a noise like thunder. Fear is contagious. The coachman, at Cauvignac's threat, realized that some great danger was impending, and seized the reins. "Where are we going?" he faltered. "To Bordeaux! to Bordeaux!" cried Nanon from within the carriage. "To Libourne, ten thousand furies!" cried Cauvignac. "Monsieur, the horses will fall before they have gone two leagues." "I don't ask them to go so far!" retorted Cauvignac, spurring them with his sword. "Let them hold out as far as Ferguzon's camp, that's all I ask." The heavy vehicle thereupon set forth at a terrifying pace. Men and horses, sweating, gasping, bleeding, urged one another on, the first by their shouts, the others by their loud neighing. Nanon tried to resist, to free herself, to leap down from the carriage, but she exhausted her strength in the struggle, and soon fell back utterly worn out; she was no longer conscious of what was taking place. By dint of seeking to distinguish Cauvignac amid the hurly-burly of fleeing shadows, her head went round and round; she closed her eyes with a despairing cry, and lay cold and motionless in her maid's arms. Cauvignac rode forward to the horses' heads. His horse left a trail of fire along the road. "Help, Ferguzon! help!" he cried. His call was answered by a cheer in the distance. "Demons of hell," cried Cauvignac, "you are playing against me, but I believe, upon my soul, that you will lose again to-day. Ferguzon! Ferguzon! help!" Two or three musket shots rang out in their rear, and were answered by a general discharge from in front. The carriage came to a stand-still; two of the horses fell from exhaustion, and a third was struck by a bullet. Ferguzon and his men fell upon the troops of Monsieur de La Rochefoucauld; as they outnumbered them three to one, the Bordelais soon found it hopeless to continue the struggle; they turned tail and fled, and victors and vanquished, pursuers and pursued, vanished in the darkness like a cloud driven by the wind. Cauvignac remained with the footmen and Francinette beside the insensible Nanon. Luckily they were within a hundred yards of the village of Carbonblanc. Cauvignac carried Nanon in his arms as far as the first house; and there, having given orders to bring up the carriage, placed his sister upon a bed, and, taking from his breast an object which Francinette could not distinguish, slipped it into the poor woman's clenched hand.