Louis Blanc settled his bill at the hotel, walked to the station and left his black bag at the consigne. He went out into the town again, bought some bread and cheese and a bottle of wine, and had supper at an estaminet. About nine o’clock he started out of Amiens on foot, not hurrying, for he had plenty of time to reach Beaucourt before daylight.
About an hour before sunrise he pushed through a gap in a hedge south of the Rue Romaine and worked his way through the orchards to the back of the stone house opposite Manon’s café. Bibi had explored the stone house on one of his previous visits. Its staircase had not been destroyed, and it was possible to reach the upper rooms, one of which still retained its joists and a few floor boards. This particular room faced the street and had had a ragged hole drilled in its front wall by the shell of an English sixteen-pounder. Bibi entered the stone house from the yard at the back, treading very carefully lest he should set a tin rolling or crack a piece of fallen tile under his boot. He sat down in one of the ground-floor rooms until there was sufficient light to prevent him bungling the climb up the rickety stairs. The ruin was full of the greyness of the dawn when he took his boots off, crawled up the stairs, and, scrambling across the joists, lay flat on the platform of floor boards, and close to the hole in the wall.
He had a good view of the house across the street, and by moving his head he found that he could see the whole of it, and also a large part of the garden. The shell-hole in the wall was less than a foot in diameter, and by keeping well back in the shadow Bibi felt pretty sure that his face would be almost invisible to any one across the way. He had been lying there about twenty minutes when he heard the café door unlocked, and saw Brent come out with a bucket in his hand. Paul dropped out of Bibi’s view when he jumped down from the raised path and went to the well to draw water. Bibi heard him washing in the street, and sousing his head in the bucket.
But Louis Blanc was tired. He had the whole day before him, and he had his own particular plan. He meant to make Paul fight, hand to hand and body to body, and he wanted to eliminate the odds in favour of a man who might carry a pistol in his pocket. So Bibi ate some of his bread and drank a few mouthfuls of wine, and went to sleep, curled up against the wall.
The day’s work was in full swing over the way when Louis Blanc woke up and looked out through his porthole. It was a March morning, with a wind humming in the ruins and clouds moving quickly across a broad blue sky. Paul was up on the roof, fixing the rafters on the other half of the house, and the splashes of passing sunlight played upon the white timber, his blue breeches and darker coat. It was the sound of his hammering that had awakened Bibi. Manon was at work in the garden, sleeves and skirt rolled up, turning over the soil with a spade.
Bibi lay like a big cat and watched them. The morning passed away, and about noon he saw Manon enter the house and move to and fro in the kitchen. Smoke showed at the top of the chimney, signalling the approach of the dinner hour. Presently Manon appeared on the path and called to her man, and Brent came down from the roof.
When the meal was over, Bibi saw Paul standing at the kitchen window, lighting his pipe. Manon was clearing the table, and talking to Paul. Brent loitered a moment, and then came out on to the footpath.
“I shall be back before dark.”
Bibi heard the words very clearly. He saw Brent turn back when he had passed the window, and take something out of his pocket.
“I’ll leave you this.”