"Give me the horn which I presented to you," said Pierre, "whose note served to make your coming known to me. When you hear its sound once more, go forth without fear, and share in the triumph you have so nobly prepared."
Gabriel thanked Pierre heartily, helped him select the men who were to go with him into the city to assist the French troops in case of need, and graciously accompanied them as far as the gate of the fort, out of which they were to pretend they had been driven in disgrace.
By the time this was done it was half past seven, and the first streaks of dawn were visible in the sky.
Gabriel desired to make sure personally that the French standards which were to bring peace to the mind of Monsieur de Guise and strike terror to the English men-of-war were hoisted over the fort. Consequently he ascended to the platform which had been the scene of the main events of that glorious but fateful morning.
With pallid cheeks he drew near the spot at which the rope ladder had been attached, and whence poor Martin-Guerre had been hurled, the victim of a fatal mistake.
Shudderingly he leaned over the abyss, expecting to see the mutilated corpse of his faithful squire on the rocks below.
At first he failed to espy him, and his eye glanced hither and thither in surprise, mingled with a faint hope.
A leaden spout, by which the rain-water from the tower was carried off, had stopped the body midway in its terrible fall; and there Gabriel saw it hanging, motionless and doubled up over the spout.
At first sight he thought that life was extinct, but he desired to pay the last tokens of respect in any event.
Pilletrousse, whom Martin-Guerre had always been fond of, was looking on weeping, and his devotion to his friend seconded his master's pious reflections. He fastened himself securely to the rope ladder, and ventured down into the abyss.