Marius obeyed him, and the men obeyed Marius, and vanished into the gloom of the archway.

After all, thought Monsieur de Condillac, they need go no farther than that doorway; they must have appreciated the situation by now; and he was confident they would have the sense to hold themselves in readiness for a rush in the moment of Garnache's mounting.
But Garnache's next order shattered that last hope.
"Rebecque," said he, without turning his head, "go and lock them in." Before bidding the men go that way, he had satisfied himself that there was a key on the outside of the door.

"Monsieur de Condillac," he resumed to Marius, "you will order your men in no way to hinder my servant.

I shall act upon any menace of danger to my lackey precisely as I should were I, myself, in danger." Marius's heart sank within him, as sinks a stone through water.

He realized, as his mother had realized a little while before, that in Garnache they had an opponent who took no chances.