“You know what we suffered in the first days of our suspense, after the success of your stratagem,” said Trudaine, turning to Lomaque.  “I think it was on the evening after we had seen you for the last time at St. Lazare that strange, confused rumors of an impending convulsion in Paris first penetrated within our prison walls.  During the next few days the faces of our jailers were enough to show us that those rumors were true, and that the Reign of Terror was actually threatened with overthrow at the hands of the Moderate Party.  We had hardly time to hope everything from this blessed change before the tremendous news of Robespierre’s attempted suicide, then of his condemnation and execution, reached us.  The confusion produced in the prison was beyond all description.  The accused who had been tried and the accused who had not been tried got mingled together.  From the day of Robespierre’s arrest, no orders came to the authorities, no death-lists reached the prison.  The jailers, terrified by rumors that the lowest accomplices of the tyrant would be held responsible, and be condemned with him, made no attempt to maintain order.  Some of them—­that hunchback man among the rest—­deserted their duties altogether.  The disorganization was so complete, that when the commissioners from the new Government came to St. Lazare, some of us were actually half starving from want of the bare necessities of life.  To inquire separately into our cases was found to be impossible.  Sometimes the necessary papers were lost; sometimes what documents remained were incomprehensible to the new commissioners.  They were obliged, at last, to make short work of it by calling us up before them in dozens.  Tried or not tried, we had all been arrested by the tyrant, had all been accused of conspiracy against him, and were all ready to hail the new Government as the salvation of France.  In nine cases out of ten, our best claim to be discharged was derived from these circumstances.  We were trusted by Tallien and the men of the Ninth Thermidor, because we had been suspected by Robespierre, Couthon, and St. Just.  Arrested informally, we were now liberated informally.  When it came to my sister’s turn and mine, we were not under examination five minutes.  No such thing as a searching question was asked of us; I believe we might even have given our own names with perfect impunity.  But I had previously instructed Rose that we were to assume our mother’s maiden name—­Maurice.  As the citizen and citoyenne Maurice, accordingly, we passed out of prison—­under the same name we have lived ever since in hiding here.  Our past repose has depended, our future happiness will depend, on our escape from death being kept the profoundest secret among us three.  For one all sufficient reason, which you can easily guess at, the brother and sister Maurice must still know nothing of Louis Trudaine and Rose Danville, except that they were two among the hundreds of victims guillotined during the Reign of Terror.”