"I am all amazement," cried Claude, "I am bewildered. Married! Such a thing would be my highest wish. But I don't understand all this. How is it possible to think of marriage at such a time as this?"
"Well, I will now explain that," said the priest. "The late commandant is a friend of mine. We were acquainted with each other years ago in France. As soon as Cazeneau made his appearance here, and you were arrested, I went to him and told him the whole story of your parents, as I have just now told you. He had heard something about their sad fate in former years, and his sympathies were all enlisted. Besides, he looks upon Cazeneau as a doomed man, the creature of the late regime, the fallen government. He expects that Cazeneau will be speedily recalled, disgraced, and punished. He also expects that the honors of the Count de Montresor will be restored to you. He is sufficient of an aristocrat to prefer an old and honorable name, like Montresor, to that of a low and unprincipled adventurer, like Cazeneau, and does not wish to see the Countess Laborde fall a victim to the machinations of a worn-out scoundrel. And so the ex-commandant will do all that he can. Were it not for him, I do not think I could succeed in freeing both of you, though I still might contrive to free you alone."
"O, my dear Père Michel! What can I say? I am dumb!"
"At midnight. There will be a change of guards then. The new sentry will be favorable; he will run away with us, so as to save himself from punishment."
"To-night. You will go from here to the commandant's residence, and then out. But we must haste, for by daybreak Cazeneau will discover all--perhaps before. We can be sure, however, of three hours. I hope it will be light. Well, we must trust to Providence. And now, my son, farewell till midnight."
Claude remained alone once more, with his brain in a whirl from the tumult of thought which had arisen. This interview with the priest had been the most eventful hour of his life. He had learned the secret of his parentage, the wrongs and sufferings of his father and mother, the villany of Cazeneau, the true reason for the bitter enmity which in him had triumphed over gratitude, and made him seek so pertinaciously the life of the man who had once saved his own.