Page:Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume 2.djvu/26



reasons which may be divined, did not allow of my proceeding at once to my paternal abode; and, alighting at the house of one of my aunts, I learnt the death of my father, which sad intelligence was soon confirmed by my mother, who received me with a tenderness widely contrasting with the treatment I had experienced during the two years of my absence. She was extremely anxious to keep me with her; but it was absolutely necessary that I should be constantly concealed, and I did not leave the house for three months. At the end of that time my confinement began to weary me, and I went out, sometimes under one disguise and sometimes under another. I thought I had not been recognised, when suddenly a report spread through the town that I was there, and the police began to search for me, making constant visits to my mother, without, however, discovering the place of my concealment, which was not very large, being only ten feet long and six wide; but I had so well contrived it, that a person, who afterwards purchased the house, lived in it nearly four years without suspecting the existence of this place, and would probably never have known it had I not revealed it to him.

Secure in my retreat, out of which I thought it would be difficult to surprise me, I soon took fresh excursions. One day, on Shrove Tuesday, I even carried my daring to such an extent as to appear at a ball, in the midst of upwards of two hundred persons. I was dressed as a marquis; and a female, with whom I had been on intimate terms, having recognized me,