“Have you a knife?” said Monk to the fisherman.
“Yes, monsieur.”
“Cut down this tree; then.”
The fisherman obeyed, but not without notching his cutlass. When the ash was cut and fashioned into the shape of a lever, the three men penetrated into the vault.
“Stop where you are,” said Monk to the fisherman. “We are going to dig up some powder; your light may be dangerous.”
The man drew back in a sort of terror, and faithfully kept to the post assigned him, whilst Monk and Athos turned behind a column at the foot of which, penetrating through a crack, was a moonbeam, reflected exactly on the stone which the Comte de la Fere had come so far in search.
“This is it,” said Athos, pointing out to the general the Latin inscription.
“Yes,” said Monk.
Then, as if still willing to leave the Frenchman one means of evasion,—
“Do you not observe that this vault has already been broken into,” continued he, “and that several statues have been knocked down?”