class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[Pg 14]"/> Oise and direct them to the wood of La Muette, where Denis Lamotte, the vine-dresser of Saint-Leu, had come to fetch them.

Such was the result of Manginot's enquiries. He had reconstructed Georges' itinerary with most remarkable perspicacity and this was the more important as the chain of stations from the sea to Paris necessitated long and careful organisation, and as the conspirators used the route frequently. Thus, two men mentioned in the disembarkation of August 23d had returned to Biville in mid-September. On October 2d Georges and three of his officers, coming from Paris, had again presented themselves before Lamotte, who had conducted them to the wood of La Muette, where Massignon was waiting for them. It was proved that their journeys had been made with perfect regularity; the same guides, the same night marches, the same hiding-places by day. The house of Boniface Colliaux at Feuquières, that of Monnier at Aumale, and the farm of La Poterie seemed to be the principal meeting-places. Another passage took place in the second fortnight of November, and another in December, corresponding to a new disembarkation. In January, 1804, Georges made the journey for the fourth time, to await at Biville the English corvette bringing Pichegru, the Marquis de Rivière and four other conspirators. A fisherman called Étienne Horné gave some valuable details of this arrival. He had noticed particularly the man who appeared to be the leader—"a fat man, with a full, rather hard face, round-shouldered, and with a slight trouble in his arms."

"These gentlemen," he added, "usually arrived at night, and left about midnight; they were satisfied with our humble fare, and always kept together in a corner, talking."

When the tide was full Horné went down to the beach to watch for the sloop. The password was "Jacques," to which the men in the boat replied "Thomas."

Manginot, as may well be imagined, arrested all who in any way had assisted the conspirators, and hurried them off to Paris. The tower of the Temple became crowded with peasants, with women in Normandy caps, and fishermen of Dieppe, dumbfounded at finding themselves in the famous place where the monarchy had suffered its last torments. But these were only the small fry of the conspiracy, and the First Consul, who liked to pose as the victim exposed to the blows of an entire party, could not with decency take these inoffensive peasants before a high court of justice. While waiting for chance or more treachery to reveal the refuge of Georges Cadoudal, the discovery of the organisers of the plot was most important, and this seemed well-nigh impossible, although Manginot had reason to think that the centre of the conspiracy was near Aumale or Feuquières.

His attention had been attracted by a deposition mentioning the black horse that Georges had ridden from Preuseville to Aumale—the one that the school-master Monnier had hidden in a corridor of his house. With this slight clue he started for the country. There he learned that a workman called Saint-Aubin, who lived in the hamlet of Coppegueule, had been ordered to take the horse to an address on a letter which Monnier had given him. This man, when called upon to appear, remembered that he had led the horse "to a fine house in the environs of Gournay." When he arrived there a servant had taken the animal to the stables, and a lady had come out and asked for the letter, but he denied all knowledge of the lady's name or the situation of the house.

Manginot resolved to search the country in company with Saint-Aubin, but he was either stupid or pretended to be so, and refused to give any assistance. He led the gendarmes six leagues, as far as Aumale, and said, at first, that he recognised the Château de Mercatet-sur-Villers, but on looking carefully at the avenues and the arrangement of the buildings, he declared he had never been there. The same thing happened at Beaulevrier and at Mothois; but on approaching Gournay his memory returned, and he led Manginot to a house in the hamlet of Saint-Clair which he asserted was the one to which Monnier had sent him. On entering the courtyard he recognised the servant to whom he had given the horse six months before, a groom named Joseph Planchon. Manginot instantly arrested the man, and then began his search.

The house belonged to an ex-officer of marine, François Robert d'Aché, who rarely occupied it, being an ardent sportsman and preferring his estates near Neufchâtel-en-Bray, where there was more game. Saint-Clair was occupied by Mme. d'Aché, an invalid who rarely left her room, and her two daughters, Louise and Alexandrine, as well as d'Aché's mother, a bedridden octogenarian, and a young man named Caqueray, who was also called the Chevalier de Lorme, who farmed the lands of M. and Mme. d'Aché, whose property had recently been separated by law. Caqueray looked upon himself as one of the family, and Louise, the eldest girl, was betrothed to him.

Nothing could have been less suspicious than the members of this patriarchal household, who seemed to know nothing of politics, and whose tranquil lives were apparently unaffected by revolutions. The absence of the head of so united a family was the only astonishing thing about it. But Mme. d'Aché and her daughters explained that he was bored at Saint-Clair and usually lived in Rouen, that he hunted a great deal, and spent his time between his relatives who lived near Gaillon and friends at Saint-Germain-en-Laye. They could not say where he was at present, having had no news of him for two months.

But on questioning the servants Manginot learned some facts that changed the aspect of affairs. Lambert, the gardener, had recently been shot at Evreux, convicted of having taken part with a band of Chouans in an attack on the stage-coach, Caqueray's brother had just been executed for the same cause at Rouen. Constant Prévot, a farm hand, accused of having killed a gendarme, had been acquitted, but died soon after his return to Saint-Clair. Manginot had unearthed a nest of Chouans, and only when he learned that the description of d'Aché was singularly like that of the mysterious Beaumont who had been seen with Georges at La Poterie, Aumale and Feuquières, did he understand the importance of his discovery. After a rapid and minute inquiry, he took it upon himself to arrest every one at Saint-Clair, and sent an express to Réal, informing him of the affair, and asking for further instructions.

It had been the custom for several years, when a person was denounced to the police as an enemy of the government, or a simple malcontent, to have his name put up in Desmarets' office, and to add to it, in proportion to the denunciations, every bit of information that could help to make a complete portrait of the individual. That of d'Aché was consulted. There were found annotations of this sort: "By reason of his audacity he is one of the most important of the royalists," "Last December he took a passport at Rouen for Saint-Germain-en-Laye, where he was called by business," "His host at Saint-Germain, Brandin de Saint-Laurent, declares that he did not sleep there regularly, sometimes two, sometimes three days at a time." At last a letter was intercepted addressed to Mme. d'Aché, containing this phrase, which they recognised as Georges' style: "Tell M. Durand that things are taking a good turn,... his presence is necessary.... He will have news of me at the Hôtel de Bordeaux, rue de Grenelle, Saint-Honoré, where he will ask for Houvel." Now Houvel was the unknown man who, first of all, had gone to the vine-dresser of Saint-Leu to persuade him to aid the "brigands." Thus d'Aché's route was traced from Biville to Paris and the conclusion drawn that,