From the court the burglars made their way into
the vestry of the chapel, where they found a large chest,
strengthened with iron bands and closed with four locks. One
of these locks they picked, and then, by levering up the
corner, forced the other three. Inside was a small coffer,
of walnut wood, also barred with iron, but fastened with only
three locks, which were all comfortably picked by way of the
keyhole. In the walnut coffer - a joyous sight by our
thieves' lantern - were five hundred crowns of gold. There
was some talk of opening the aumries, where, if they had only
known, a booty eight or nine times greater lay ready to their
hand; but one of the party (I have a humorous suspicion it
was Dom Nicolas, the Picardy monk) hurried them away. It was
ten o'clock when they mounted the ladder; it was about
midnight before Tabary beheld them coming back. To him they
gave ten crowns, and promised a share of a two-crown dinner
on the morrow; whereat we may suppose his mouth watered. In
course of time, he got wind of the real amount of their booty
and understood how scurvily he had been used; but he seems to
have borne no malice. How could he, against such superb
operators as Petit-Jehan and De Cayeux; or a person like
Villon, who could have made a new improper romance out of his
own head, instead of merely copying an old one with
mechanical right hand?
The rest of the winter was not uneventful for the gang.
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