“It is that one of us, chosen by lot, shall go to Paris and keep the rest informed, with the cipher agreed upon, of all that happens there.”
“Agreed!” they replied.
“In that case,” resumed the president, “let us write our thirteen names, each on a slip of paper. We put them in a hat. He whose name is first drawn shall start immediately.”
The young men, one and all, approached the table, and wrote their names on squares of paper which they rolled and dropped into a hat. The youngest was told to draw the lots. He drew one of the little rolls of paper and handed it to the president, who unfolded it.
“Morgan!” said he.
“What are my instructions?” asked the young man.
“Remember,” replied the president, with a solemnity to which the cloistral arches lent a supreme grandeur, “that you bear the name and title of Baron de Sainte-Hermine, that your father was guillotined on the Place de la Révolution and that your brother was killed in Condé’s army. Noblesse oblige! Those are your instructions.”
“And what else?” asked the young man.
“As to the rest,” said the president, “we rely on your royalist principles and your loyalty.”
“Then, my friends, permit me to bid you farewell at once. I would like to be on the road to Paris before dawn, and I must pay a visit before my departure.”