"What do you mean by that? Come, I am in no humour for joking."
Angelot looked at him and shrugged his shoulders.
"It is a road, but not the road," he said. "No one in his senses would drive this way to Lancilly. This part of it is bad enough; further on, where it goes down into the valley, it is much worse; I doubt if a heavy carriage could pass. You turned to the right too soon. Martin Joubard forgot this lane, perhaps. He would hardly have directed you this way—unless—"
"Unless what?"
"Unless he wished to show you the nature of the country, in case you should think of invading it in force."
The two Chouans laughed.
"Well said, Angelot!" muttered César d'Ombré.
Georges de Sainfoy, stiff and haughty, did not trouble himself about any jest or earnest concealed under his cousin's speech and the way the neighbours took it. He realised, perhaps, that in this wild west country the name of Napoleon was not altogether one to conjure with, that he had not left the enemies of the Empire behind him in Spain. But he realised, too, that this was hardly the place or the time to assert his own importance and his master's authority.
"Do you mean that this road is utterly impassable?" he said to Angelot. "How then did these gentlemen—"
"They did not come from Lancilly. They drove across the moor from my uncle's house, Les Chouettes, and turned into the lane a few hundred yards higher up. As to impassable—I think your wheels will come off, if you attempt it, and your horses' knees will suffer. Where the ruts are not two feet deep, the bare rock is almost perpendicular."