All this while the little captive king was living in total ignorance that there was such a thing as a plot for his escape. Release was something he had long given up as hopeless. Sometimes, even to his childish mind, it seemed as though death alone could free him from his long imprisonment. He was grieved and sad over the thought of Laurent's approaching departure, for he had begun to cherish a real affection for this first kindly man who had come into his life in many a weary month. He dreaded to think who might take his place, though Gomin was still to be there. But Gomin had to give much of his time to the sister on the floor above. On the night of March twenty-ninth, Laurent bade a tender farewell to Louis Charles. When the door at last closed behind him, the boy threw himself on his bed in a violent fit of weeping. It was here that Gomin found him when he came in later with his supper. Gomin himself was nervous, excited and ill at ease, for this was the appointed time for the second great move in the scheme of liberation. On him this time depended success! For a while the child refused to eat anything. This distressed Gomin beyond measure, for it was important that the meal should be eaten, since it was heavily dosed with opium. Nothing could be well accomplished unless the boy were rendered unconscious. At last, to please his keeper, Louis Charles swallowed the food though it almost choked him. "Why am I so sleepy?" he presently asked. "It is not yet time to go to bed!" "You have worn yourself out with crying," answered Gomin. "You had better let me put you to bed at once." The boy complied, his eyelids sinking more and more each moment, and before he was half undressed he had fallen into a heavy slumber. But Gomin did not put him in bed. On the contrary, he wrapped him in a large shawl, and opening the door, made a sign to someone outside. Barelle and Debièrne entered with a huge basket that at first seemed empty. When the door was closed, however, they removed a false bottom, and there lay the sick child, sleeping soundly but not drugged. Quick as a flash the change was made. The strange boy lay in the little king's bed, clothed in the king's own gown and cap, and Louis XVII was placed at the bottom of the basket. The false bottom was again adjusted, and the remaining space piled with odds and ends of waste that had accumulated during Laurent's stay.