He was endeavoring to get around the billiard-table so as to be near the door, and had almost succeeded, when an exultant cry arose: 

“Here is the quilt! the quilt!” they cried.

“Put him in the quilt, the pretty fairy’s lover!”

Gaston heard these cries.  He saw himself overcome, and suffering an ignoble outrage at the hands of these enraged men.

By a dexterous movement he extricated himself from the grasp of the three who were holding him, and felled a fourth to the ground.

His arms were free; but all his enemies returned to the charge.

Then he seemed to lose his head, and, seizing a knife which lay on the table where the travelling agents had been dining, he plunged it into the breast of the first man who rushed upon him.

This unfortunate man was Jules Lazet.  He dropped to the ground.

There was a second of silent stupor.

Then four or five of the young men rushed forward to raise Lazet.  The landlady ran about wringing her hands, and screaming with fright.  Some of the assailants rushed into the street shouting, “Murder!  Murder!”

The others once more turned upon Gaston with cries of “Vengeance! kill him!”

He saw that he was lost.  His enemies had seized the first objects they could lay their hands upon, and he received several wounds.  He jumped upon the billiard-table, and, making a rapid spring, dashed through the large glass window of the cafe.  He was fearfully cut by the broken glass and splinters, but he was free.

Gaston had escaped, but he was not yet saved.  Astonished and disconcerted at his desperate feat, the crowd for a moment were stupefied; but, recovering their presence of mind, they started in pursuit of him.

The weather was bad, the ground wet and muddy, and heavy black clouds were rolling westward; but the night was not dark.

Gaston ran on from tree to tree, making frequent turnings, every moment on the point of being seized and surrounded, and asking himself what course he should take.

Finally he determined, if possible, to regain Clameran.

With incredible rapidity he darted diagonally across the fair-ground, in the direction of the levee which protected the valley of Tarascon from inundations.

Unfortunately, upon reaching this levee, planted with magnificent trees which made it one of the most charming walks of Provence, Gaston forgot that the entrance was closed by a gate with three steps, such as are always placed before walks intended for foot-passengers, and rushed against it with such violence that he was thrown back and badly bruised.

He quickly sprang up; but his pursuers were upon him.

This time he could expect no mercy.  The infuriated men at his heels yelled that fearful cry which in the evil days of lawless bloodshed had often echoed in that valley:  “In the Rhone with him!  In the Rhone with the marquis!”