“At once,” was the Parisian’s answer. “I leave Grenoble to-night. I hope to set out in an hour’s time. Meanwhile I’ll have the troopers form a guard of honour. I am lodged over the way.”
Tressan, but too glad to be quit of him, rose there and then to give the necessary orders, and within ten minutes Garnache was back at the Sucking Calf with six troopers and a sergeant, who had left their horses in the Seneschal’s stables until the time for setting out. Meanwhile Garnache placed them on duty in the common-room of the inn.
He called for refreshment for them, and bade them remain there at the orders of his man Rabecque. His reason for this step was that it became necessary that he should absent himself for a while to find a carriage suitable for the journey; for as the Sucking Calf was not a post-house he must seek one elsewhere—at the Auberge de France, in fact, which was situate on the eastern side of the town by the Porte de Savoie—and he was not minded to leave the person of Valerie unguarded during his absence. The half-dozen troopers he considered ample, as indeed they were.
On this errand he departed, wrapped tightly in his cloak, walking briskly through the now heavier rain.
But at the Auberge de France a disappointment awaited him. The host had no horses and no carriage, nor would he have until the following morning. He was sorrow-stricken that the circumstance should discompose Monsieur de Garnache; he was elaborate in his explanations of how it happened that he could place no vehicle at Monsieur de Garnache’s disposal—so elaborate that it is surprising Monsieur de Garnache’s suspicions should not have been aroused. For the truth of the matter was that the folk of Condillac had been at the Auberge de France before him—as they had been elsewhere in the town wherever a conveyance might be procurable—and by promises of reward for obedience and threats of punishment for disobedience, they had contrived that Garnache should hear this same story on every hand. His mistake had lain in his eagerness to obtain a guard from the Seneschal. Had he begun by making sure of a conveyance, anticipating, as he should have done, this move on the part of the Condillacs—a move which he did not even now suspect—it is possible that he might have been spared much of the trouble that was to follow.
An hour or so later, after having vainly ransacked the town for the thing he needed, he returned wet and annoyed to the Veau qui Tote. In a corner of the spacious common-room—a corner by the door leading to the interior of the inn—he saw the six troopers at table, waxing a trifle noisy over cards. Their sergeant sat a little apart, in conversation with the landlord’s wife, eyes upturned adoringly, oblivious of the increasing scowl that gathered about her watchful husband’s brow.
At another table sat four gentlemen—seemingly travellers, by their air and garb—in a conversation that was hushed at Garnache’s entrance. But he paid no heed to them as he stalked with ringing step across the rushstrewn floor, nor observed how covertly and watchfully their glances followed him as returning, in passing the sergeant’s prompt salute he vanished through the doorway leading to the stairs.
He reappeared again a moment later, to call the host, and give him orders for the preparing of his own and Rabecque’s supper.
On the landing above he found Rabecque awaiting him.
“Is all well?” he asked, and received from his lackey a reassuring answer.