Once more de Fresne was requested to proceed. This time he got almost without interruption to the crisis, which he managed to represent as a few of the men leaving the wood in panic, shooting at and wounding their leader, on whom they had previously laid hands. But at that point he was not unnaturally questioned.
"You could not stop all this insubordination?"
"I did my best, but since M. de la Rocheterie himself could not control the men——"
"What was M. de la Rocheterie doing all this time, then?"
"I told you," answered de Fresne hurriedly. "They had disarmed him, and were holding him. He could do nothing."
"Then when the alarm came they let him go?"
"N . . . no."
"But they could hardly have shot him while some of their accomplices were holding him."
De Fresne looked at the floor. "By that time they had tied him to a tree."
It was out at last, pronounced in words . . . and caused a silence—but hardly a merciful one. And the eyes, the eyes on Aymar! If Laurent could only have shielded him from them. . . . The questioner's voice took up again: