"Yes, I came to see how she fares, and behold what I find—torn by storms—ruined—dead." He stooped, and took up a fragment of the rose-tree and kissed it.
"But the Chateau des Anges is not five leagues away. I will go there. I will go now. I will learn what all this means."
With this resolution he ran fleetly down the slopes of the park, now wreathed in the rising mists of night, towards the feudal village of Charrebourg, through which his path lay.
Breathless and eager, as if heaven were before him and all the fiends of hell at his heels, he sped through the darkening town, and did not slacken his speed until he was a full mile beyond it.
He had been so absorbed with the single idea that had seized upon his mind, that he was scarcely conscious of the objects he had passed or the speed at which he ran.
As he looked round upon the moonlit scenery among which he found himself, he felt for a moment stunned and perplexed; he slackened his pace and thought over his expedition. It lost none of its romantic fascination; he only wondered that he had not made a journey to the Chateau des Anges at least once in every week.
How beautiful the moonlight was! how soft the air! how enchanting the scenery! and oh, what vague possibilities of glory and rapture might not be unfolded in the undeveloped future of this wild excursion!
It was fully a quarter past twelve when Gabriel reached the point, at which the road directly leading to the Chateau des Anges diverged from that which he had been hitherto travelling. Just as he did so, a carriage and four, with two postillions and two mounted servants beside, came to a sudden stop within a few score paces of the pedestrian, and one of the men dismounting secured some part of the harness which had given way, and was getting into the saddle again when Gabriel arrived at the side of the carriage. He then made a momentary pause. In the brilliant moonlight every detail of the equipage was visible; the coach was dingy and battered, its principal color blue, and covered, according to the fashion, with gilded arabesques in cumbrous relief, in which a curious dragon, with a barbed tongue and tail, was contending in a hundred repetitions with as many little cupids. Just as these details seized upon his imagination, the window was suddenly opened, and a lady put out her head and in thrilling tones cried—
"Gabriel, Gabriel—save me, save me."
He saw Lucille's face; it was her voice that rang in his ears. He felt his strength multiplied a hundred fold. He would have, single-handed, fought an army in such a quarrel. With a cry of delight, that burst from his very soul, he sprang to the side of the carriage and grasped the door. Before he reached it, however, some one from within had drawn her away and shut the window close, and the horses being again in motion, and rapidly quickening their pace to a gallop, Gabriel ran by the side, tugging vainly at the door, until one of the mounted attendants, spurring beside, seized him by the collar, and flung him headlong upon the road.