"No matter; "tis a thousand to one that you are right."
"It is only a suspicion founded upon divers circ.u.mstances; but even a suspicion--"
"May give you scent of the truth. And here was I, going like a gull into the snare!--Once more, what could I have been thinking of?"
"It is so difficult to be on guard against certain appearances."
"You need not tell me so, my dear Morok, you need not tell me so."
During this mysterious conversation, Dagobert was on thorns; he saw vaguely that a violent storm was about to burst. He thought only of how he should still keep his anger within bounds.
Morok again approached the judge, and glancing at the orphans, recommenced speaking in a low voice. "Oh" cried the burgomaster, with, indignation, "you go too far now."
"I affirm nothing," said Morok, hastily; "it is a mere supposition founded on--" and he again brought his lips close to the ear of the judge.
"After all, why not?" resumed the magistrate, lifting up his hands; "such people are capable of anything. He says that he brings them from the heart of Siberia: why may not all this prove to be a tissue of impudent falsehoods?--But I am not to be made a dupe twice," cried the burgomaster, in an angry tone, for, like all persons of a weak and shifting character, he was without pity for those whom he thought capable of having beguiled his compa.s.sion.
"Do not be in a hurry to decide--don"t give to my words more weight than they deserve," resumed Morok with a hypocritical affectation of humility. "I am unhappily placed in so false a position with regard to this man,"--pointing to Dagober--"that I might be thought to have acted from private resentment for the injury he has done me; perhaps I may so act without knowing it, while I fancy that I am only influenced by love of justice, horror of falsehood, and respect for our holy religion.
Well--who lives long enough will know--and may heaven forgive me if I am deceived!--In any case, the law will p.r.o.nounce upon it; and if they should prove innocent, they will be released in a month or two."
"And, for that reason, I need not hesitate. It is a mere measure of precaution; they will not die of it. Besides, the more I think of it, the more it seems probable. Yes this man is doubtless a French spy or agitator, especially when I compare these suspicions with the late demonstration of the students at Frankfort."
"And, upon that theory, nothing is better fitted to excite and stir up those hot-headed youths than--" He glanced significantly at the two sisters; then, after a pause, he added with a sigh, "Satan does not care by what means he works out his ends!"
"Certainly, it would be odious, but well-devised."
"And then, Mr Burgomaster, look at him attentively: you will see that this man has a dangerous face. You will see--"
In continuing thus to speak in a low tone, Morok had evidently pointed to Dagobert. The latter, notwithstanding his self-command, felt that the restraint he had imposed upon himself, since his arrival at this unlucky inn, and above all wince the commencement of the conversation between Morok and the burgomaster, was becoming no longer bearable; besides, he saw clearly that all his efforts to conciliate the favor of the judge were rendered completely null by the fatal influence of the brute-tamer; so, losing patience, he advanced towards him with his arms folded on his breast, and said to him in a subdued voice: "Was it of me that you were whispering to Mr. Burgomaster?"
"Yes," said Morok, looking fixedly at him.
"Why did you not speak out loud?" Having said this, the almost convulsive movement of his thick moustache, as he stood looping Morok full in the face, gave evidence of a severe internal conflict. Seeing that his adversary preserved a contemptuous silence, he repeated in a sterner voice: "I ask you, why you did not speak out loud to Mr.
Burgomaster, when you were talking of me?"
"Because there are some things so shameful, that one would blush to utter them aloud," answered Morok insolently.
Till then Dagobert had kept his arms folded; he now extended them violently, clenching his fists. This sudden movement was so expressive that the two sisters uttered a cry of terror, and drew closer to him.
"Hark ye, Mr. Burgomaster!" said the soldier, grinding his teeth with rage: "bid that man go down, or I will not answer for myself!"
"What!" said the burgomaster, haughtily; "do you dare to give orders to me?"
"I tell you to make that man go down," resumed Dagobert, quite beside himself, "or there will be mischief!"
"Dagobert!--good heaven!--be calm," cried the children, grasping his hands.
"It becomes you, certainly--miserable vagabond that you are--not to say worse," returned the burgomaster, in a rage: "it becomes you to give orders to me!--Oh! you think to impose upon me, by telling me you have lost your papers!--It will not serve your turn, for which you carry about with you these two girls, who, in spite of their innocent looks, are perhaps after all--"
"Wretch!" cried Dagobert, with so terrible a voice and gesture that the official did not dare to finish. Taking the children by the arm before they could speak a word, the soldier pushed them back into the chamber; then, locking the door, and putting the key into his pocket, he returned precipitately towards the burgomaster, who, frightened at the menacing air and att.i.tude of the veteran, retreated a couple of steps, and held by one hand to the rail of the staircase.
"Listen to me!" said the soldier, seizing the judge by the arm. "Just now, that scoundrel insulted me--I bore with it--for it only concerned myself. I have heard patiently all your idle talk, because you seemed for a moment to interest yourself in those poor children. But since you have neither soul, nor pity, nor justice--I tell you that, burgomaster though you are--I will spurn you as I would spurn that dog," pointing again to the Prophet, "if you have the misfortune to mention those two young girls, in any other way than you would speak of your own child!--Now, do you mark me?"
"What!--you dare to say," cried the burgomaster, stammering with rage, "that if I happen to mention two adventuresses--"
"Hats off!--when you speak of the daughters of the Duke of Ligny," cried the soldier, s.n.a.t.c.hing the cap of the burgomaster and flinging it on the ground. On this act of aggression, Morok could not restrain his joy.
Exasperated and losing all hope, Dagobert had at length yielded to the violence of his anger, after struggling so painfully against it for some hours.
When the burgomaster saw his cap at his feet, he looked at the brute tamer with an air of stupefaction, as if he hesitated to believe so great an enormity. Dagobert, regretting, his violence, and feeling that no means of conciliation note remained, threw a rapid glance around him, and, retreating several paces, gained the topmost steps of the staircase. The burgomaster stood near the bench, in a corner of the landing-place, whilst Morok, with his arm in the sling, to give the more serious appearance to his wound, was close beside him. "So!" cried the magistrate, deceived by the backward movement of Dagobert, "you think to escape, after daring to lift hand against me!--Old villain!"
"Forgive me, Mr. Burgomaster! It was a burst of rashness that I was not able to control. I am sorry for it," said Dagobert in a repentant voice, and hanging his head humbly.
"No pity for thee, rascal! You would begin again to smooth me over with your coaxing ways, but I have penetrated your secret designs. You are not what you appear to be, and there is perhaps an affair of state at the bottom of all this," added the magistrate, in a very diplomatic tone. "All means are alike to those who wish to set Europe in flames."
"I am only a poor devil, Mr. Burgomaster; you, that have a good heart, will show me some mercy."
"What! when you have pulled off my cap?"
"And you," added the soldier, turning towards Morok, "you, that have been the cause of all this--have same pity upon me--do not bear malice!--You, a holy man, speak a word in my favor to Mr. Burgomaster."
"I have spoken to him what I was bound to speak," answered the Prophet ironically.
"Oho! you can look foolish enough now, you old vagabond! Did you think to impose on me with lamentations?" resumed the burgomaster, advancing towards Dagobert. "Thanks be, I am no longer your dupe!--You shall see that we have good dungeons at Leipsic for French agitators and female vagrants, for your damsels are no better than you are. Come," added he, puffing out his cheeks with an important air, "go down before me--and as for you, Morok--"
The burgomaster was unable to finish. For some minutes Dagobert had only sought to gain time, and had cast many a side-glance at a half-open door on the landing-place, just opposite to the chamber occupied by the orphans: finding the moment favorable, he now rushed quick as lightning on the burgomaster, seized him by the throat, and dashed him with such violence against the door in question, that the magistrate, stupefied by this sudden attack, and unable to speak a word or utter a cry, rolled over to the further end of the room, which was completely dark. Then, turning towards Morok, who, with his arm enc.u.mbered by the sling, made a rush for the staircase, the soldier caught him by his long, streaming hair, pulled him back, clasped him with hands of iron, clapped his hand over his mouth to stifle his outcries, and notwithstanding his desperate resistance, dragged him into the chamber, on the floor of which the burgomaster lay bruised and stunned.
Having double-locked the door, and put the key in his pocket, Dagobert descended the stairs at two bounds, and found himself in a pa.s.sage, that opened on the court-yard. The gate of the inn was shut, and there was no possibility of escape on that side. The rain fell in torrents. He could see through the window of a parlor, in which a fire was burning, the host and his people waiting for the decision of the burgomaster. To bolt the door of the pa.s.sage, and thus intercept all communication with the yard, was for the soldier the affair of an instant, and he hastened upstairs again to rejoin the orphans.
Morok, recovering from his surprise, was calling for help with all his might; but, even if the distance had permitted him to be heard, the noise of the wind and rain would have drowned his outcries. Dagobert had about an hour before him, for it would require some time to elapse before the length of his interview with the magistrate would excite astonishment; and, suspicion or fear once awakened, it would be necessary to break open two doors--that which separated the pa.s.sage from the court-yard, and that of the room in which the burgomaster and the Prophet were confined.
"My children, it is now time to prove that you have a soldier"s blood in your veins," said Dagobert, as he entered abruptly the chamber of the young girls, who were terrified at the racket they had heard for some minutes.
"Good heaven, Dagobert! what has happened?" cried Blanche.
"What do you wish us to do?" added Rose.
Without answering, the soldier ran to the bed, tore off the sheets, tied them strongly together, made a knot at one end, pa.s.sed it over the top of the left half of the cas.e.m.e.nt, and so shut it in. Thus made fast by the size of the knot, which could not slip through, the sheets, floating on the outside, touched the ground. The second half of the window was left open, to afford a pa.s.sage to the fugitives.
The veteran next took his knapsack, the children"s portmanteau, and the reindeer pelisse, and threw them all out of the window, making a sign to Spoil-sport to follow, to watch over them. The dog did not hesitate, but disappeared at a single bound. Rose and Blanche looked at Dagobert in amazement, without uttering a word.
"Now, children," said he to them, "the doors of the inn are shut, and it is by this way," pointing to the window, "that we must pa.s.s--if we would not be arrested, put in prison--you in one place, and I in the other--and have our journey altogether knocked on the head."
"Arrested! put in prison!" cried Rose.
"Separated from you!" exclaimed Blanche.
"Yes, my poor children!--They have killed Jovial--we must make our escape on foot, and try to reach Leipsic--when you are tired, I will carry you, and, though I have to beg my way, we will go through with it.
But a quarter of an hour later, and all will be lost. Come, children, have trust in me--show that the daughters of General Simon are no cowards--and there is yet hope."