"I can't," answered the man, with a good-humored roar of laughter: "the young devil has got my wrist as tight as if every finger was a vice. My hand was not in his pocket; for, by St. Ann, he did not let me get it fairly in. I was only going to search him."
"Let the man's hand go, young gentleman," said the officer. "You mention a safe-conduct. Let me see it."
"It is here," said Edward Langdale, drawing forth a handsome gilt leather case. "I beg you to promise that it shall be returned to me when you have examined it."
"It shall, if I find it all in proper form," replied the other; "but, in the mean time, you will have to go to the lines, for I cannot examine passes by moonlight. Some one see and catch the two horses. Have you found the other man? Ah, there he is. Catch the horses, I say."
In the mean time he had opened the case and taken out the passport, which, when spread out in the pale light, showed all the appearance of an ordinary safe-conduct; and Edward, anxious to prevent any search for Lucette and her guard, observed, in a quiet tone, "You will remark that the paper covers more than myself and my servant; but, hearing that there was danger on the road to Niort, we left the others behind."
"Then tell me, sir," said the officer, gravely, "how came it, when you were furnished with such a safe-conduct as this, you attempted to pass the lines without showing it, and tried to hide yourself when you saw my party?"
"Oh, in Rochelle they tell very bloody tales of you gentlemen up here," replied Edward, laughing; "and I thought that at Niort I could show it with less trouble."
"Then you come from Rochelle, do you?" said the officer. "Probably you came over in Lord Denbigh's fleet?"
"No," answered the young man, boldly. "I came over before, in a merchant-vessel; but I was obliged to stay some days in Rochelle to hire servants and to get well; for I was ill there."
"Indeed," said the officer,—not in any tone of interest, but merely as one of those insignificant ejaculations which men employ to stop a gap when they have nothing else to say; and he continued humming some of the Parisian airs which are now technically known as Pont neufs, till the horses were caught,—which was not till after half an hour's ineffectual effort; for they had some spirit and some skittishness. Indeed, it might have been as well—under fear of the critics—to tell the reader that the part of the country which we are now treading is rather famous for the sale of horses, which, though not so good as the Limousin, are of the same race, very hardy and sometimes very fleet.