“No,” said Chapeau. “When the moment for starting came, he insisted on being carried with the army; he followed us in a carriage, but the jolting of the road was too much for him—the journey killed him. He died at Fougères, on the third day after we left Laval.”
“And Madame?” asked the stranger.
“It is impossible for me now,” said Chapeau, “to tell you all the dangers through which she passed, all the disguises which she had to use, and the strange adventures which for a long time threatened almost daily to throw her in the hands of those who would have been delighted to murder her; but of course you know that she escaped at last.”
“I am told that she still lives in Poitou, and I think I heard that, some years after M. de Lescure’s death, she married M. Louis Larochejaquelin.”
“She did so—the younger brother of my own dear lord. He was a boy in England during our hot work in La Vendée.”
“Yes; and he served in an English regiment.”
“So I had heard, Monsieur; but you know, don’t you, that he also has now fallen.”
“Indeed no!—for years and years I have heard nothing of the family.”
“It was only two months since: he fell last May at the head of the Vendeans, leading them against the troops which the Emperor sent down there. The Vendeans could not endure the thoughts of the Emperor’s return from Elba. M. Louis was the first to lift his sword, and Madame is, a second time, a widow. Poor lady, none have suffered as she has done!” He then paused a while in his narrative, but as the stranger did not speak, he continued: “but of M. Henri, of course, Monsieur, you heard the fate of our dear General?”
“I only know that he perished, as did so many hundred others, who were also so true and brave.”