After some more discussion, the porter was at last allowed to proceed with his hand-cart.  The hawker wanted to interfere, but Mouchy warned her off and ordered her to be silent.  “Ah! ah!” she cried, “what does it matter to me?  Let him sell his wine if he can; I shall not drink any on his premises.  This is the second time he has found a surety to my knowledge; the beggar must have some special secret for encouraging the growth of fools.  Good-bye, gossip Derues; you know I shall be selling your history some day.  Meanwhile——­

“The abominable history of Leroi de Valine, condemned to death at the age of sixteen for having poisoned his entire family!”

Whilst she amused the people by her grimaces and grotesque gestures, and while Mouchy held forth to some of them, Derues made his escape.  Several times between Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois and the rue de la Mortellerie he nearly fainted, and was obliged to stop.  While the danger lasted, he had had sufficient self-control to confront it coolly, but now that he calculated the depth of the abyss which for a moment had opened beneath his feet, dizziness laid hold on him.

Other precautions now became necessary.  His real name had been mentioned before the commissionaire, and the widow Masson, who owned the cellar, only knew him as Ducoudray.  He went on in front, asked for the keys, which till then had been left with her, and the chest was got downstairs without any awkward questions.  Only the porter seemed astonished that this supposed wine, which was to be sold immediately, should be put in such a place, and asked if he might come the next day and move it again.  Derues replied that someone was coming for it that very day.  This question, and the disgraceful scene which the man had witnessed, made it necessary to get rid of him without letting him see the pit dug under the staircase.  Derues tried to drag the chest towards the hole, but all his strength was insufficient to move it.  He uttered terrible imprecations when he recognised his own weakness, and saw that he would be obliged to bring another stranger, an informer perhaps, into this charnel-house, where; as yet, nothing betrayed his crimes.  No sooner escaped from one peril than he encountered another, and already he had to struggle against his own deeds.  He measured the length of the trench, it was too short.  Derues went out and repaired to the place where he had hired the labourer who had dug it out, but he could not find the man, whom he had only seen once, and whose name he did not know.  Two whole days were spent in this fruitless search, but on the third, as he was wandering on one of the quays at the time labourers were to be found there, a mason, thinking he was looking for someone, inquired what he wanted.  Derues looked well at the man, and concluding from his appearance that he was probably rather simpleminded, asked—­

“Would you like to earn a crown of three livres by an easy job?”