It was an occasion on which, one might hazard to say, La Main Noire met his match. Late of Yorkshire, at that time living in France as a successful merchant, Reginald Taylor as his wont would take often to the open road in the hooded guise of the highwayman, thus to deprive wealthy aristos of their overburdened purses, and to convey these moneys into more deserving hands. Clad all in midnight sable, a pair of Dragoon pistols crossed in his belt, the gallant brigand continued in Louis the Well-Beloved's kingdom the work he had begun in George Augustus's. The king's infantry and musketeers pursued him in vain, and La Main Noire continued his activities unchecked. One late summer afternoon, during that second year of the Austro-Prussian War, a well-appointed carriage was making its way along the wide road from Calais to the City of Lights. Its furnishings were of intricately worked brass, the curtains hanging in the well-fitted windows of a russet gold. The driver was a sturdy enough fellow, the dust of two decades in the seat still clinging to his hair.
