Page:Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume 1.djvu/94

 disguise would have bid defiance to any description of my person. Without being at all uneasy, I approached, and with the most natural tone I begged him to pass into a closet, the glass door of which looked on the banquet-room. "It is Vidocq whom you are looking for," said I; "if you will wait for ten minutes you will see him. There is his cover, he cannot be long. When he enters, I will make you a sign; but if you are alone, I doubt if you can seize him, as he is armed, and resolved to defend himself."—"I have my gendarmes on the staircase," answered he, "and if he escapes" "Take care how you place them then," said I with affected haste. "If Vidocq should see them he would mistrust some plot, and then farewell to the bird."—"But where shall I place them?"—"Oh, why in this closet—mind, no noise, that would spoil all; and I have more desire than yourself that he should not suspect anything." My commissary was now shut up in four wails with his agents. The door, which was very strong, closed with a double lock. Then, certain of time for escape, I cried to my prisoners, "You are looking for Vidocq—well, it is he who has caged you; farewell." And away I went like a dart, leaving the party shouting for help, and making desperate efforts to escape from the unlucky closet.

Two escapes of the same sort I effected, but at last I was arrested and carried back to St Peter's Tower, where, for greater security, I was placed in a dungeon with a man named Calendrin, who was also thus punished for two attempts at escape. Calendrin, who had known me during my first confinement in the prison, imparted to me a fresh plan of escape, which he had devised by means of a hole worked in the wall of the dungeon of the galley-slaves with whom we could communicate. The third night of my detention all was managed for our escape, and eight of the prisoners who first went out were so fortunate as to avoid