"Gros Guillem!" said the man who peered on the freebooter from above.
"Draw me up!" gasped the Captain, "or by——"
"Do you threaten—you—situated as you are?"
"I pray you give the windlass another turn."
"Ah, you pray now, Gros Guillem!"
The Captain looked above his head at the face that overhung him. There was in it something that sent the blood back to his heart. There was in it that likeness to a someone, uncertain, recalled but unidentified, that came out now with terrible distinctness, and insisted on his straining his powers for recognition.
"Gros Guillem! do you remember me? This is our final meeting—the fourth and the last!"
At that moment the tocsin pealed forth its summons from the tower. This tower, planted under a concave opening in the rock, sent out the ring of the alarm-bell multiplied thirtyfold below; it flung it forth in volumes, it sent it up and down the Dordogne valley—across it—over the level land, far, far away, wave on wave of sound through the still night.
At the first note it was as though a magic wand had touched every house in La Roque. Each window was illumined. Every door was opened, and forth burst men with torches, all fully armed.
In a moment the three companions of the Captain on the platform and the two by the postern were surrounded, disarmed, bound or cut down. In a moment, also, from orchards, vineyards, from out of barns, from behind hedgerows, rose a multitude of men, peasants, fishermen, soldiers of the Bishop, serving-men, all with what weapons they could most readily handle, and closed in on the men of Guillem who had come forward at the note of the bell with purpose to enter by the postern. Then ensued on all sides a wild hubbub of cries, shrieks, shouts of triumph, curses, prayers for mercy.