"Tankeru, the blacksmith, was arrested day before yesterday in his house, taken to Vannes, and broken alive on the wheel, along with Madok the miller. The inoffensive Paskou the Long, the 'Baz-valan' of my nuptials, was not spared either—he was hanged, like so many thousands of other insurgents!"
Nominoë rose, took up and opened his traveling wallet, and drew from it the iron head of a heavy blacksmith's hammer.
"Look at this, Bertha! This shall be joined to our family relics—sad and painful relics of a serf family."
"What sort of a hammer is that? It carries, cut into the iron head the Breton words Ez-Libr."
"They mean To Be Free. It was the device of Tankeru the blacksmith. He used this hammer as his weapon during the insurrection. I arrived this morning before dawn in the forest of Mezlean, feeling greatly alarmed over the fate of Tina's father. I went to his house early this morning. I calculated upon waiting there for nightfall, not daring to draw near Mezlean by daylight. I found at Tankeru's house only his desolate old mother. Tankeru had been arrested. Distracted with despair she informed me of her son's execution. My eyes alighted upon his hammer which lay near his extinct forge. I took its iron head. The blacksmith's hammer shall be joined to our symbolic relics. The manuscripts and the relic are to be forwarded to a relative, an artisan at Vannes, who will transmit them to his children. One of them will, perhaps, continue our plebeian annals by writing the history of Mademoiselle Plouernel and Nominoë Lebrenn."
Nominoë then proceeded to write and to read as he wrote:
"I, Nominoë Lebrenn, write this on the 17th of July, 1675, at the manor of Mezlean, one hour before dawn. Bertha of Plouernel is standing beside me. In a few minutes we shall leave the manor, which is surrounded by soldiers. The passage that leads from the close to the orchard runs under the road along which the sentries are on watch."
Nominoë stopped writing and asked Bertha:
"I understand it will be easy for us to reach the fields and the seashore after we are in the orchard?"
"Very easy, my friend. The owners of this manor had the vaulted passage dug under the road in order not to have to cross it every time they wished to go to the garden. The high walls that surround it will shelter us from the sight of the soldiers. The door that leads to the fields can be easily opened."