Meanwhile, on this very day, before dawn, amid the dim shadows of the forest, the following scene took place on the bit of road that leads from Javené to Lécousse.

All the roads of the Bocage are shut in between high banks, and those enclosing the one that runs from Javené to Parigné by way of Lécousse are even higher than usual; indeed the road, winding as it does, might well be called a ravine. It leads from Vitré, and has had the honor of jolting Madame de Sévigné’s carriage. Shut in as it is by hedges on the right and on the left, no better spot for an ambush could well be found.

That morning, one hour before Michelle Fléchard, starting from a different part of the forest, had reached the first village, where she beheld the funereal apparition of the wagon escorted by the gendarmes, a crowd of unseen men, concealed by the branches, crouched in the thickets through which the road from Javené runs after it crosses the bridge over the Couesnon. They were, peasants dressed in coats of skin, such as were worn by the kings of Brittany in the sixteenth century and by the peasants in the eighteenth. Some were armed with muskets, others with axes. Those who had axes had just built in a glade a kind of funeral pile of dry fagots and logs, which was only waiting to be set on fire. Those who had muskets were posted on both sides of the road, in the attitude of expectancy. Could one have seen through the leaves, he might have discovered on every side fingers resting on triggers and guns aimed through the openings made by the interlacing of the branches. These men were lying in wait. All the muskets converged towards the road, which had begun to whiten in the rising dawn.

Amid this twilight low voices were carrying on a dialogue: –

“Are you sure of this?”

“Well, that’s what they say.”

“She is about to go by?”

“They say she is in this neighborhood.”

“She must not leave it.”

“She must be burned.”

“We three villages have come out for that very purpose.”

“And how about the escort?”

“It is to be killed.”

“But will she come by this road?”

“So they say.”

“Then she is coming from Vitré.”

“And why shouldn’t she?”

“Because they said she was coming from Fougères.”

“Whether she comes from Fougères or from Vitré, she certainly comes from the devil.”

“That is true.”

“And she must go back to him.”

“I agree to that.”

“Then she is going to Parigné?”

“So it seems.”

“She will not get there.”

“No.”

“No, no, no!”

“Attention!”

It was the part of prudence to be silent now, since it was growing quite light.

Suddenly these men lurking in ambush held their breath, as they heard the sound of wheels and horses’ feet. Peering through the branches, they caught an indistinct glimpse of a long wagon, a mounted escort, and something on the top of the wagon, all of which was coming towards them along the hollow road.

“There she is,” cried the one who appeared to be the leader.

“Yes, and the escort too,” said one of the men who lay in wait.

“How many are there?”

“Twelve.”

“It was said that there were to be twenty.”

“Twelve or twenty, let us kill them all.”

“Wait till they are within our reach.”

A little later and the wagon with its escort appeared at a turn of the road.

“Long live the King!” cried the peasant leader; and as he spoke, a hundred muskets were fired at the same instant. When the smoke scattered, the escort was scattered likewise. Seven horsemen had fallen, and the other five had made their escape. The peasants rushed to the wagon. “Hallo! this is not the guillotine,” cried the leader; “it’s a ladder.”

In fact, there was nothing whatever in the wagon but a long ladder.

The two wounded horses had fallen, and the driver had been killed by accident.

“There is something suspicious about a ladder with an escort, all the same,” said the leader. “It was going in the direction of Parigné. No doubt it was intended for scaling the Tourgue.”

“Let us burn the ladder,” cried the peasants.

As to the funereal wagon for which they were watching, it had taken another road, and was already two miles farther away, in the village where Michelle Fléchard had seen it pass at sunrise.