Tristan looked silently at the prisoner’s hands, then he said to Cornelius, pointing to them:—­

“Those are not the hands of a beggar, nor of an apprentice.  He is a noble.”

“Say a thief!” cried the torconnier.  “My good Tristan, noble or serf, he has ruined me, the villain!  I want to see his feet warmed in your pretty boots.  He is, I don’t doubt it, the leader of that gang of devils, visible and invisible, who know all my secrets, open my locks, rob me, murder me!  They have grown rich out of me, Tristan.  Ha! this time we shall get back the treasure, for the fellow has the face of the king of Egypt.  I shall recover my dear rubies, and all the sums I have lost; and our worthy king shall have his share in the harvest.”

“Oh, our hiding-places are much more secure than yours!” said Georges, smiling.

“Ha! the damned thief, he confesses!” cried the miser.

The grand provost was engaged in attentively examining Georges d’Estouteville’s clothes and the lock of the door.

“How did you get out those screws?”

Georges kept silence.

“Oh, very good, be silent if you choose.  You will soon confess on the holy rack,” said Tristan.

“That’s what I call business!” cried Cornelius.

“Take him off,” said the grand provost to the guards.

Georges d’Estouteville asked permission to dress himself.  On a sign from their chief, the men put on his clothing with the clever rapidity of a nurse who profits by the momentary tranquillity of her nursling.

An immense crowd cumbered the rue du Murier.  The growls of the populace kept increasing, and seemed the precursors of a riot.  From early morning the news of the robbery had spread through the town.  On all sides the “apprentice,” said to be young and handsome, had awakened public sympathy, and revived the hatred felt against Cornelius; so that there was not a young man in the town, nor a young woman with a fresh face and pretty feet to exhibit, who was not determined to see the victim.  When Georges issued from the house, led by one of the provost’s guard, who, after he had mounted his horse, kept the strong leathern thong that bound the prisoner tightly twisted round his arm, a horrible uproar arose.  Whether the populace merely wished to see this new victim, or whether it intended to rescue him, certain it is that those behind pressed those in front upon the little squad of cavalry posted around the Malemaison.  At this moment, Cornelius, aided by his sister, closed the door, and slammed the iron shutters with the violence of panic terror.  Tristan, who was not accustomed to respect the populace of those days (inasmuch as they were not yet the sovereign people), cared little for a probable riot.

“Push on! push on!” he said to his men.

At the voice of their leader the archers spurred their horses towards the end of the street.  The crowd, seeing one or two of their number knocked down by the horses and trampled on, and some others pressed against the sides of the horses and nearly suffocated, took the wiser course of retreating to their homes.