Page:Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume 2.djvu/146

. St Germain was about to return, and demand the performance of my promise. What was I to do? Ought I to inform the individual, that we were about to rob him together? If it had been possible to have avoided accompanying St Germain, it would not have been so dangerous to have given such notice; but I had promised to assist him, and had no pretext for getting off from my promise, and I waited for him as I should have done for a sentence of death. One, two, three weeks passed in these perplexities, and at the end of this time I began to breathe again; and when two months had elapsed, was perfectly at my ease, thinking that he had been apprehended, as well as his two companions. Annette (I shall always remember it) made a nine days' vow, and burnt at least a dozen wax candles in token of joy. "I pray to heaven," she sometimes said, "that they may continue where they are." The torment had been of long duration, but the moments of calm were brief, and they preceded the catastrophe which decided my existence.

The 3rd of May 1809, at day-break, I was awakened by several knocks at my warehouse door; and going down to see, was on the point of opening the door, when I heard some voices in conversation in a low tone. "He is a powerful man," said one; "we must be wary!" There was no doubt concerning the motives of this early visit, and I returned hastily to my chamber, told Annette what had passed, and opening the window, whilst she entered into conversation with the officers, I glided out in my shirt, by a door which opened on the staircase, and soon reached the upper story; at the fourth I saw an open door and entered, looked about me, listened, and found I was alone. In a recess in the wall was a bed, hidden by a ragged crimson damask curtain. Pressed by circumstances, and sure that the staircase was guarded, I threw myself beneath the mattress; but scarcely had I lain down when some one entered, whom I