“You mean there really is danger here?”
The driver laughed gruffly as he replied:
“Sans-culottes from Saulieu are out on the warpath. They’ve been joined by former olive mill workers down that way. They burned down the château of the Comte d’Veraux night before last. They have this place in mind. The people do not love Les Vignes. Your own cousins are with the rabble!”
Grigge stood with the note in his hand, looking up at Champar.
“He says to consult with you in case of danger,” he gasped. It was more than for a moment he could sense or understand. Here was word from Dian. He was trusted to fulfill a mission—trusted! Dian had chosen him. He had written, “I trust you!” Whatever he did he would do like Champar, for Dian’s sake!
Why should he save the inhabitants at Les Vignes? There was nothing that they had ever done for him. Days of vengeance were at hand! He stood still in the roadway, the letter clasped tight in his hand.
“You understand that if they are to get away it must be at once. I can take them some of the way at no great risk to myself. I will take them to a barn near Calais. The shepherd, in his note to me, says they must go there. He trusted these letters to that farmer boy, Raoul. Well, the shepherd is not afraid to trust! Come, we must go up to the house. A coach driver has the chance to learn many things, and I know the rabble have shouted the name Saint Frère and Les Vignes. I know they will come!” As he spoke, the coach driver took Grigge’s arm.
Grigge never, as long as he lived, forgot those few minutes there in the dusky twilight. He often lived them over in the after years. He was fighting with himself. At last he said, “I must go, too, for I have a mission to look after in Calais. Come, we will go to them.”
The coach driver talked very fast as they went through the woods. They must have some sort of a disguise, all of them. They could wear the servants’ clothes, and have, at least, the look of decent farmer people. They must be made to understand that they must come with them in order to save their lives, and that they must do as they are told. This pleased Grigge very much! At least he would show them that they were entirely at the mercy of himself and the driver! They would do as they were told!
They found everyone out on the terrace, and when Grigge and the driver approached, Bertran and Denise ran to meet them.