Page:Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume 2.djvu/151

 persons who would exert themselves personally in the apprehension of a thief, are prevented from fear of struggling with a man whom the feeling of crime and the prospect of a scaffold, drives probably to despair.

I had been shut up for two hours; there was no noise either in the house or in the street, and the groups had dispersed; I was beginning to take courage, when I heard a key thrust into the lock, and whilst I again squatted beneath the coverlid, the father, mother, son, and daughter Fossé entered.

The father and son were quarrelling, and by the interference of the mother I had no doubt but blows would arise, when, throwing aside the tattered curtains, I made my appearance in the midst of the astonished family. It may be imagined how much the good folks were surprised. Whilst they were looking at me without saying a word, I told them as briefly as possible how I had got amongst them; how I had concealed myself under the mattress, &c. The husband and wife were astonished that I had not been stifled in my place of concealment; they pitied me, and with a cordiality not uncommon amongst people of their class, offered me refreshments which were necessary after so painful a morning.

It may be supposed that I was on thorns during the progress of the whole affair; I perspired copiously; at any other moment I should have been amused; but when I reflected on the inevitable results of a discovery, none less than myself could appreciate the burlesque of my situation. Supposing myself lost, I would have expedited the fatal moment, it would have cut short my train of perplexities; a reflection on the mobility of circumstances determined me to wait the event; I knew from more than one hour of experience, that the best contrived schemes of man are disconcerted, and sometimes we triumph over the most desperate cases.

After the reception afforded me by the Fossé family, it was probable that I should have no reason to repent