That night, so impatiently awaited, came at length.  At midnight the heavy steps resounded up the wooden stairway.  The room was prepared for the service; the altar was dressed.  This time the sisters opened the door and hastened to light the entrance.  Mademoiselle de Langeais even went down a few stairs that she might catch the first glimpse of their benefactor.

“Come!” she said, in a trembling and affectionate voice.  “Come, you are expected!”

The man raised his head, gave the nun a gloomy look, and made no answer.  She felt as though an icy garment had fallen upon her, and she kept silence.  At his aspect gratitude and curiosity died within their hearts.  He may have been less cold, less taciturn, less terrible than he seemed to these poor souls, whose own emotions led them to expect a flow of friendship from his.  They saw that this mysterious being was resolved to remain a stranger to them, and they acquiesced with resignation.  But the priest fancied he saw a smile, quickly repressed, upon the stranger’s lip as he saw the preparations made to receive him.  He heard the Mass and prayed, but immediately disappeared, refusing in a few courteous words the invitation given by Mademoiselle de Langeais to remain and partake of the humble collation they had prepared for him.

After the 9th Thermidor the nuns and the Abbe de Marolles were able to go about Paris without incurring any danger.  The first visit of the old priest was to a perfumery at the sign of the “Queen of Flowers,” kept by the citizen and citoyenne Ragon, formerly perfumers to the Court, well known for their faithfulness to the royal family, and employed by the Vendeens as a channel of communication with the princes and royal committees in Paris.  The abbe, dressed as the times required, was leaving the doorstep of the shop, situated between the church of Saint-Roch and the Rue des Fondeurs, when a great crowd coming down the Rue Saint-Honore hindered him from advancing.

“What is it?” he asked of Madame Ragon.

“Oh, nothing!” she answered.  “It is the cart and the executioner going to the Place Louis XV.  Ah, we saw enough of that last year! but now, four days after the anniversary of the 21st of January, we can look at the horrid procession without distress.”

“Why so?” asked the abbe.  “What you say is not Christian.”

“But this is the execution of the accomplices of Robespierre.  They have fought it off as long as they could, but now they are going in their turn where they have sent so many innocent people.”

The crowd which filled the Rue Saint-Honore passed on like a wave.  Above the sea of heads the Abbe de Marolles, yielding to an impulse, saw, standing erect in the cart, the stranger who three days before had assisted for the second time in the Mass of commemoration.

“Who is that?” he asked; “the one standing—­”

“That is the executioner,” answered Monsieur Ragon, calling the man by his monarchical name.