His leader gave a little smile. "I had just as soon surrender it to you; and you have none yourself now.—But perhaps you would rather not wear mine."
De Fresne looked from the sheathed blade on the table to its owner, and abruptly held out his hand.
But Aymar shook his head. "No—not yet. Afterwards, if you like. . . . And now, how are you going to account to the men for my departure?"
"You will have to say something yourself, I think, L'Oiseleur.—My God, how I hate doing this!"
Aymar had sat down again. "Let me put you in possession of certain facts before I leave you," he said composedly. "First, about du Tremblay. Of course I—you—cannot support him now. I sent de Soulanges to him on Saturday morning with the news, but you must know nevertheless what his plans are. I believe I have not yet destroyed the cipher notes I made at our interview." He searched in a pocket. "No, here they are; and I can leave them with you as a memorandum. I put them into cipher because secrecy as to his real intention is all important. You see that on Friday next he proposes to move along the Aven in such a way as to deceive the Bonapartists into thinking that he means to cross. But he will not cross; his real objective is Chalais, which, having caused the enemy to concentrate, as he hopes, on the wrong side of the river, he calculates on carrying by a coup de main. Meanwhile—what's that?"
He sprang up, thrusting the paper back into his pocket, for there had come a sudden rush of feet and of excited voices outside, and—an unprecedented thing—the hut door was abruptly flung wide, revealing two or three of the Eperviers. For a second L'Oiseleur stood amazed; the next, he strode forward.
"What is the meaning of this? Who told you to come here?"
A confused babel from outside answered him. All his remaining men appeared to be there, and among them, of course, the towering form of Magloire Le Bihan. But he seemed to be trying to keep the crowd back.
"If you have a spokesman I will hear you," said Aymar, frowning. "Otherwise, leave my quarters at once!"
One of the foremost invaders, advancing a little over the threshold, thereupon threw out a hand towards de Fresne, and said meaningly, "Perhaps he can explain what happened at Pont-aux-Rochers!" And instantly other voices took him up. "He knows who the traitor was!" "L'Oiseleur, make him tell us!"