"Au revoir, my sister; au revoir, Diane! And now go! I will stay here. You wandered out by yourself to take the air. We shall meet soon again; and once more I thank you."
Diane hastily descended the steps and ran to meet the people, who with torches in their hands were calling her name everywhere with all their might, Mother Monique at their head.
Who, by seemingly foolish hints, had aroused the superior? Who, if not Master Arnauld, who with the most grief-stricken air was among those who were hunting for Sister Bénie? No one had such an ingenuous air as this rascal could assume, wherein he resembled the true Martin-Guerre so much the more.
Gabriel, reassured as to Diane's safety when he saw her join Mother Monique and her search-party unharmed, was making ready to leave the fortifications himself, when suddenly a dark form rose from the ground behind him.
A man, an enemy, armed from head to foot, was just bestriding the wall.
To rush at this man and prostrate him with one blow of his sword, crying in a sonorous voice, "Alarm! alarm!" to spring to the top of the ladder, covered with Spaniards, which was placed against the wall,—was the work of but an instant for Gabriel.
It was an attempted night surprise, and Gabriel had not erred: the enemy had made the two day assaults in quick succession to enable them to make this bold attempt at night with better chance of success.
But Providence or, to speak more accurately, if perhaps with less religious feeling, love had led Gabriel to the spot. Before another man had time to follow upon the platform the one he had already killed, he seized with his strong hands the two uprights of the ladder and overturned it, with the ten men who were upon it.
Their cries as they struck the ground were confused with Gabriel's unceasing shouts, "To arms!" But at a distance of twenty paces another ladder was already against the wall; and at that point there was no footing for Gabriel. Luckily he spied in the shadow a large rock; and the imminent peril increasing his strength, he succeeded in raising it upon the parapet, whence he had only to push it over upon the second ladder. The great weight broke it in two at a blow; and the poor wretches who were swarming up fell into the moat, bruised or dying, their agonizing shrieks causing their companions to hesitate.
Meanwhile Gabriel's shouts had given the alarm; the sentinels had taken it up; the drums were beating to arms; the alarm-bell on La Collégiale was ringing lustily. Five minutes had not elapsed ere more than a hundred men had joined Vicomte d'Exmès, and were ready to assist him in repulsing any assailants who might still dare to show their heads, and likewise firing upon those who were in the moat, and unable to respond to the volleys from their arquebuses.