The president
of the court condemns and pardons in public; but there is
somebody else, with the power of ten thousand presidents, who now
and then condemns and pardons in private. You can guess who. I
say no more, except that I recommend you to keep your head on
your shoulders, by troubling it about nothing but the list there
in your hand. Stick to that literally, and nobody can blame you.
Make a fuss about mysteries that don't concern you, and--"
Lomaque stopped, and holding his hand edgewise, let it drop
significantly over the hunchback's head. That action and the
hints which preceded it seemed to bewilder the little man more
than ever. He stared perplexedly at Lomaque; uttered a word or
two of rough apology to his subordinate, and rolling his
misshapen head portentously, walked away with the death-list
crumpled up nervously in his hand.
"I should like to have a sight of them, and see if they really
are the same man and woman whom I looked after yesterday morning
in the waiting-room," said Lomaque, putting his hand on the cell
door, just as the deputy-jailer was about to close it again.
"Look in, by all means," said the man. "No doubt you will find
that drunken booby as wrong in what he told you about them as he
is about everything else."
Lomaque made use of the privilege granted to him immediately. He
saw Trudaine sitting with his sister in the corner of the cell
furthest from the door, evidently for the purpose of preventing
her from overhearing the conversation outside.
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