Part 1 of Book 11, Chapter 1 of the Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Book 11, Chapter 1. THE LITTLE SHOE. Part 1. La Esmeralda was sleeping at the moment when the outcasts assailed the church. Soon the ever-increasing uproar around the edifice and the uneasy bleeding of her goat which had been awakened had roused her from her slumbers. She had sat up, she had listened, she had looked. Then terrified by the light and noise, she had rushed from her cell to sea. The aspect of the plos, the vision which was moving in it, the disorder of that nocturnal assault, that hideous crowd leaping like a cloud of frogs, half seen in the gloom, the croaking of that hoarse multitude, those few red torches running and crossing each other in the darkness, like the meteors which streak the misty surfaces of marshes. This whole scene produced upon her the effect of a mysterious battle between the phantoms of the witches Sabbath and the stone monsters of the church. Imbued from her very infancy with the superstitions of the Bohemian tribe, her first thought was that she had caught the strange beings peculiar to the night in their deeds of witchcraft. Then she ran in terror to cower in her cell, asking of her pallet some less terrible nightmare. But little by little the first vapours of terror had been dissipated. From the constantly increasing noise and from many other signs of reality she felt herself besieged not by spectres, but by human beings. In her fear, though it did not increase, changed its character. She had dreamed of the possibility of a popular mutiny to tear her from her asylum. The idea of once more recovering life, hope, Phoebus, who was ever present in her future, the extreme helplessness of her condition, flight cut off, no support, her abandonment, her isolation, these thoughts and a thousand others overwhelmed her.  For even if one believes in nothing, there are moments in life when one is always of the religion of the temple which is nearest at hand.  In the midst of this anguish, she heard someone walking near her. She turned round. Two men, one of whom Cari de Lantern, had just entered her cell. She uttered a feeble cry. "'The ear nothing,' said a voice which was not unknown to her. It is I. "'Who are you?' she asked. "'Pierre Gringoire.' This name reassured her. She raised her eyes once more and recognized the poet in very fact. There stood beside him a black figure veiled from head to foot which struck her by its silence. "'Oh!' continued Gringoire in a tone of reproach. "'Jolly recognized me before you!' The little goat had not in fact waited for Gringoire to announce his name. No sooner had he entered than it rubbed itself gently against his knees, covering the poet with caresses and with white hairs, for it was shedding its hair. Gringoire returned the caresses. "'Who is that with you?' said the gypsy in a low voice. "'Be at ease,' replied Gringoire. "'Tis one of my friends.' Then the philosopher setting his lantern on the ground crouched upon the stones and exclaimed enthusiastically as he pressed Jolly in his arms. "'Oh! Tis a graceful beast. More considerable, no doubt, for its neatness than for its size. But ingenious, subtle, and lettered as a grammarian. Let us see, my Jolly, hast thou forgotten any of thy pretty tricks? How does Master Jacques Charmelloux?' The man in black did not allow him to finish. He approached Gringoire and shook him roughly by the shoulder. Gringoire rose. "'Tis true,' said he, "'I forgot that we are in haste. But that is no reason, Master, for getting furious with people in this manner. My dear and lovely child, your life is in danger, and Jolly's also. They want to hang you again. We are your friends, and we have come to save you. Follow us.' "'Is it true?' she exclaimed in dismay. "'Yes, perfectly true. Come quickly.' "'I am willing,' she stammered. But why does not your friend speak?' "'Ah!' said Gringoire. "'Tis because his father and mother were fantastic people who made him of a taciturn temperament.' She was obliged to content herself with this explanation. Gringoire took her by the hand. His companion picked up the lantern and walked on in front. Fear stunned the young girl. She allowed herself to be led away. The goat followed them, frisking, so joyous at seeing Gringoire again, that it made him stumble every moment by thrusting its horns between his legs. "'Such is life,' said the philosopher, every time that he came near falling down. "'Tis often our best friends who cause us to be overthrown.' They rapidly descended the staircase of the towers, crossed the church, full of shadows and solitude, and all reverberating with uproar, which formed a frightful contrast, and emerged into the courtyard of the cloister by the red door. The cloister was deserted. The cannons had fled to the bishop's palace in order to pray together. The courtyard was empty. A few frightened lackeys were crouching in dark corners. They directed their steps towards the door which opened from this court upon the terrain. The man in black opened it with a key which he had about him. Our readers are aware that the terrain was a tongue of land enclosed by walls on the side of the city and belonging to the chapter of Notre-Dame, which terminated the island on the east behind the church. They found this enclosure perfectly deserted. There was here less tumult in the air. The roar of the outcasts' assault reached them more confusedly and less clamorously. The fresh breeze which follows the current of a stream rustled the leaves of the only tree planted on the point of the terrain with a noise that was already perceptible. But they were still very close to danger. The nearest edifices to them were the bishop's palace and the church. It was plainly evident that there was great internal commotion in the bishop's palace. Its shadowy mass was all furrowed with lights which flitted from window to window. As when one has just burned paper there remains a somber edifice of ashes in which bright sparks run a thousand eccentric courses. Beside them the enormous towers of Notre-Dame thus viewed from behind with the long nave above which they rise cut out in black against the red and vast light which filled the parvilles resembled two gigantic andirons of some cyclopean fire grate. It was to be seen of Paris on all sides waver before the eye in a gloom mingled with light. Rembrandt has such backgrounds to his pictures. The man with the lantern walked straight to the point of the terrain. There at the very brink of the water stood the worm-eaten remains of a fence of posts latticed with laths whereon a low vine spread out a few thin branches like the fingers of an outspread hand. And in the shadow cast by this trellis a little boat lay concealed. The man made a sign to Gringoire and his companion to enter. The goat followed them. The man was last to step in. Then he cut the boat's moorings, pushed it from the shore with a long boat-hook, and, seizing two oars, seated himself in the bow, rowing with all his might towards mid-stream. The sane is very rapid at this point, and he had a good deal of trouble in leaving the point of the island. Gringoire's first care on entering the boat was to place the goat on his knees. He took a position in the stern, and the young girl, whom the stranger inspired with an indefinable uneasiness, seated herself close to the poet. When our philosopher felt the boat sway, he clapped his hands and kissed Jolly between the thorns. Oh, said he, now we are safe, all four of us! He added with the air of a profound thinker. One is indebted sometimes to fortune, sometimes to ruse, for the happy issue of great enterprises. The boat made its way slowly towards the right shore. The young girl watched the unknown man with secret terror. He had carefully turned off the light of his dark lantern. A glimpse could be caught of him in the obscurity in the bow of the boat like a spectre.   Moreover he had not yet uttered a word or breathed the syllable. No other noise was heard in the boat than the splashing of the oars, filled with the rippling of the water along her sides. Oh, my soul! exclaimed Gringoire suddenly. We are as cheerful and joyous as young owls. We preserve the silence of Pythagoreans of fishes. Pascadir, my friends, I should greatly like to have someone speak to me. The human voice is music to the human ear. It is not I who say that, but Dydemus of Alexandria, and they are illustrious words. Assuredly, Dydemus of Alexandria is no mediocre philosopher. One word, my lovely child, say but one word to me I entreat you.  Do you still make it? Do you know, my dear, that Parliament hath full jurisdiction over all places of asylum, and that you were running a great risk in your little chamber at Notre-Dame? Alas! the little bird trocholus maketh its nest in the jaws of the crocodile. Master, here is the moon reappearing. If only they do not perceive us. We are doing a laudable thing in saving Mademoiselle, and yet we should be hung by order of the king if we were caught. Alas! Human actions are taken by two handles. That is branded with disgrace in one which is crowned in another. He admires Cicero, who blames Catiline. Is it not so, Master? What say you to this philosophy? I possess philosophy by instinct, by nature, O tapis geometrium. Come! No one answers me. What unpleasant moods you two are in. I must do all the talking alone. That is what we call a monologue in tragedy. Pascadieu! I must inform you that I have just seen the king, Louis XI, and that I have caught his oath from him. Pascadieu! They are still making a hearty howl in the city. Tissa villainous, malicious old king! He is all swalled in furs. He still owes me the money for my epithelium, and he came within a nick of hanging me this evening, which would have been very inconvenient to me. He is niggerly towards men of merit. He ought to read the four books of Salvien of Cologne, Adverseets, Averitium, In Truth, Tissa paltry king in his ways with men of letters, and one who commits very barbarous cruelties. He is a sponge to soak money raised from the people. His saving is like the spleen which swelleth with the leanness of all the other members. Hence complaints against the hardness of the times become murmurs against the prince. Under this gentle and pious sire the gallows crack with the hung, the blocks wrought with blood, the prisons burst like over full bellies. This king hath one hand which grasps, and one which hangs. He is the procurator of Dam, Taks, and Mausier, Jebet. The great are despoiled of their dignities, and the little incessantly overwhelmed with fresh oppressions. He is an exorbitant prince. I love not this monarch. And you, master? The man in black let the garrulous poet chatter on. He continued to struggle against the violent and narrow current which separates the prow of the city and the stem of the island of Notredam, which we call today the Isle Saint-Louis. By the way, master, continued Gringoire suddenly, at the moment when we arrived on the parvée through the enraged outcasts, did your reverence observe that poor little devil whose skull your deaf man was just cracking on the railing of the gallery of the kings? I am nearsighted and could not recognize him. Do you know who he could be? The stranger answered not a word. But he suddenly ceased rowing, his arms fell as though broken, his head sank on his breast, and La Asmoralda heard him sigh convulsively. She shuddered. She had heard such sighs before. The boat, abandoned to itself, floated for several minutes with the stream. But the man in black finally recovered himself, seized the oars once more, and began to row against the current. He doubled the point of the Isle of Notredam and made for the landing place of the part of Foix. Ah, said Gringoire, yonder is the barbeau mansion. Stay, master, look! That group of black roofs which make such singular angles yonder, above that heap of black, fibrous, grimy, dirty clouds, where the moon is completely crushed and spread out like the yoke of an egg whose shell is broken, tis a fine mansion.  Above you can see the bell-tower, very delicately pierced. There is also a pleasant garden, which consists of a pond, an aviary, an echo, a mall, a labyrinth, a house for wild beasts, and a quantity of leafy alleys very agreeable to Venus. There is also a rascal of a tree, which is called the lewd, because it favoured the pleasures of a famous princess and a constable of France, who was a galant and a witt. Alas, we poor philosophers are to a constable as a plot of cabbages or a radish-bed to the garden of the Louvre. What matters it, after all, human life, for the great, as well as for us, is a mixture of good and evil. Pain is always by the side of joy, and the spondy by the dactyl. Master, I must relate to you the history of the Barbeau Mansion. It ends in tragic fashion. It was in 1319 in the reign of Philippe V, the longest reign of the kings of France. The moral of the story is that the temptations of the flesh are pernicious and malignant. Let us not rest our glance too long on our neighbor's wife, however gratified our senses may be by her beauty. Man is a very libertine thought. Adultery is a prying into the pleasures of others. O, eh! The noise-yonder is redoubling! The tumult around Notre-Dame was, in fact, increasing. They listened. Cries of victory were heard with tolerable distinctness. All at once a hundred torches, the light of which glittered upon the helmets of men at arms, spread over the church at all heights, on the towers, on the galleries, on the flying buttresses. These torches seemed to be in search of something, and soon distant clamors reached the fugitives distinctly. The gypsy! The sorceress! Death to the gypsy! The unhappy girl dropped her head upon her hands and the unknown began to row furiously towards the shore. Meanwhile, our philosopher reflected. He clasped the goat in his arms and gently drew away from the gypsy, who pressed closer and closer to him as though to the only asylum which remained to her. It is certain that Gringoire was enduring cruel perplexity. He was thinking that the goat also, according to existing law, would be hung if recaptured, which would be a great pity, poor jolly, that he had thus two condemned creatures attached to him. That his companion asked no better than to take charge of the gypsy. A violent combat began between his thoughts, in which, like the Jupiter of the Iliad, he weighed in turn the gypsy and the goat, and he looked at them alternately with eyes moist with tears, saying between his teeth, "'But I cannot save you both!' A shock informed them that the boat had reached the land at last. The uproar still filled the city. The unknown rose, approached the gypsy, and endeavored to take her arm to assist her to a light. She repulsed him and clung to the sleeve of Gringoire, who, in his turn, absorbed in the goat, almost repulsed her. Then she sprang alone from the boat. She was so troubled that she did not know what she did or whether she was going. Thus she remained for a moment, stunned, watching the water flow past. When she gradually returned to her senses, she found herself alone on the wharf with the unknown. It appears that Gringoire had taken advantage of the moment of debarcation to slip away with the goat into the blockhouses of the Rue-Grenier-sur-Laut. The poor gypsy shivered when she beheld herself alone with this man. She tried to speak, to cry out, to call Gringoire.  All at once she felt the stranger's hand on hers. It was a strong, cold hand. Her teeth chattered. She turned paler than the ray of moonlight which illuminated her. The man spoke not a word. He began to ascend towards the Plastigreve, holding her by the hand. At that moment she had a vague feeling that destiny is an irresistible force. She had no more resistance left in her. She allowed herself to be dragged along, running while he walked. At this spot the key ascended. But it seemed to her as though she were descending a slope. She gazed about her on all sides. Not a single pass or by. The key was absolutely deserted. She heard no sound. She felt no people moving, save in the tumultuous and glowing city, from which she was separated only by an arm of the Sain, and whence her name reached her, mingled with cries of, Death! The rest of Paris was spread around her in great blocks of shadows. Meanwhile, the stranger continued to drag her along with the same silence and the same rapidity. She had no recollection of any of the places where she was walking. As she passed before a lighted window she made an effort, drew up suddenly, and cried out, Help!  It was her last gleam of hope extinguished. The man in black did not utter a syllable. He held her firmly, and set out again at a quicker pace. She no longer resisted, but followed him, completely broken. From time to time she called together a little strength, and said, in a voice broken by the unevenness of the pavement and the breathlessness of her flight, Who are you? Who are you? He made no reply. They arrived thus, still keeping along the key, at a tolerably spacious square. It was the greve. In the middle a sort of black, erect cross was visible. It was the gallows. She recognized all this, and saw where she was. The man halted, turned towards her, and raised his cowl. Oh! She stammered, almost petrified. I knew well that it was he again. It was the priest. He looked like the ghost of himself. That is an effect of the moonlight. It seems as though one beheld only the specters of things in that light. "'Listen,' he said to her, and she shuddered at the sound of that fatal voice which she had not heard for a long time. He continued speaking with those brief and panting jerks, which betoken deep internal convulsions. "'Listen, we are here. I am going to speak to you. This is the greve. This is an extreme point. Destiny gives us to one another. I am going to decide as to your life. You will decide as to my soul. Here is a place. Here is a night beyond which one sees nothing. Then listen to me. I am going to tell you. In the first place, speak not to me of your Phoebus. As he spoke thus he paced to and fro, like a man who cannot remain in one place, and dragged her after him. Do not speak to me of him. Do you see? If you utter that name, I know not what I shall do, but it will be terrible.' Then, like a body which recovers its center of gravity, he became motionless once more, but his words betrayed no less agitation. His voice grew lower and lower. "'Do not turn your head aside, thus. Listen to me. It is a serious matter. In the first place, here is what has happened. All this will not be laughed at. I swear it to you. What was I saying? Remind me. Oh! There is a decree of parliament which gives you back to the scaffold. I have just rescued you from their hands. But they are pursuing you. Look!' He extended his arm toward the city. The search seemed, in fact, to be still in progress there. The uproar drew nearer. The tower of the lieutenant's house, situated opposite the greve, was full of clamors and light, and soldiers could be seen running on the opposite key with torches and these cries. "'The gypsy! Where is the gypsy? Death! Death!' "'You see that they are in pursuit of you, and that I am not lying to you. I love you. Do not open your mouth, refrain from speaking to me rather, if it be only to tell me that you hate me. I have made up my mind not to hear that again. I have just saved you. Let me finish first. I can save you wholly. I have prepared everything. It is yours at will. If you wish, I can do it.' He broke off violently. "'No, that is not what I should say.' As he went with hurried step and made her hurry also, for he did not release her, he walked straight to the gallows and pointed to it with his finger. "'Choose between us two,' he said coldly. She tore herself from his hands and fell at the foot of the gibbet, embracing that funereal support. Then she half turned her beautiful head and looked at the priest over her shoulder. One would have said that she was a holy virgin at the foot of the cross. The priest remained motionless, his finger still raised toward the gibbet, preserving his attitude like a statue. At length the gypsy said to him, "'It causes me less horror than you do.' Then he allowed his arm to sink slowly and gazed at the pavement in profound dejection. "'If these stones could speak,' he murmured, "'Yes, they would say that a very unhappy man stands here.' He went on. The young girl, kneeling before the gallows, enveloped in her long flowing hair, let him speak on without interruption. He now had a gentle and plaintive accent which contrasted, sadly, with the haughty harshness of his features. "'I love you. Oh, how true that is! So nothing comes of that fire which burns my heart.   It is a thing deserving of compassion, I assure you. You see that I speak gently to you. I really wish that you should no longer cherish this horror of me. After all, if a man loves a woman, it is not his fault. Oh, my God! What! So you will never pardon me? You will always hate me? All is over then. It is that which renders me evil, do you see, and horrible to myself. You will not even look at me. You are thinking of something else, perchance, while I stand here and talk to you, shuddering on the brink of eternity for both of us. Above all things do not speak to me of the officer. I would cast myself at your knees. I would kiss not your feet, but the earth which is under your feet. I would sob like a child. I would tear my breast, not words, but my very heart and vitals, to tell you that I love you. All would be useless, all. And yet you have nothing in your heart but what is tender and merciful. You are radiant with the most beautiful mildness. You are wholly sweet, good, pitiful, and charming. Alas! You cherish no ill will for anyone but me alone. Oh! What a fatality! He hid his face in his hands. The young girl heard him weeping. It was for the first time. Thus erect and shaken by sobs, he was more miserable and more suppliant than went on his knees. He wept thus for a considerable time. Come, he said, these first tears passed. I have no more words. I had, however, thought well as to what you would say. Now I tremble and shiver and break down at the decisive moment. I feel conscious of something supreme enveloping us, and I stammer. Oh! I shall fall upon the pavement if you do not take pity on me, pity on yourself. Do not condemn us both. If you only knew how much I love you, what a heart is mine! Oh! What desertion of all virtue! What desperate abandonment of myself! A doctor, I mock at science. A gentleman, I tarnish my own name. A priest, I make the missile a pillow of sensuality. I spit in the face of my God.  And you will not have the apostate. Oh! Let me tell you all, more still, something more horrible. Oh! Yet more horrible! As he uttered these last words, his air became utterly distracted. He was silent for a moment, and resumed as though speaking to himself and in a strong voice. Cain, what has thou done with thy brother? There was another silence, and he went on. What have I done with him, Lord?  Yes, Lord, they have just dashed his head before my eyes on the stone of thine house, and it is because of me, because of this woman, because of her. His eye was wild, his voice grew ever weaker, he repeated many times yet mechanically at tolerably long intervals, like a bell prolonging its last vibration, because of her, because of her. Then his tongue no longer articulated any perceptible sound, but his lips still moved. All at once he sank together, like something crumbling and lay motionless on the earth with his head on his knees. A touch from the young girl, as she drew her foot from under him, brought him to himself. He passed his hand slowly over his hollow cheeks and gazed for several moments at his fingers, which were wet. What! he murmured. I have wept! I'm turning suddenly to the gypsy with unspeakable anguish. Alas! You have looked coldly on at my tears! Child, do you know that those tears are of lava? Is it indeed true? Nothing touches when it comes from the man one does not love. If you were to see me die, you would laugh. Oh! I do not wish to see you die! One word! A single word of pardon! Say not that you love me. Say only that you will do it. That will suffice. I will save you. If not, oh! The hour is passing. I entreat you by all that is sacred. Do not wait until I shall have turned to stone again, like that gibbit which also claims you. Reflect that I hold the destinies of both of us in my hand, that I am mad, it is terrible, that I may let all go to destruction, and that there is beneath us a bottomless abyss on happy girl, whither my fall will follow yours to all eternity. One word of kindness! Say one word! Only one word! She opened her mouth to answer him. He flung himself on his knees to receive with adoration the word, possibly a tender one, which was on the point of issuing from her lips.  The priest clasped her in his arms with fury and began to laugh with an abominable laugh. Well, yes, an assassin, he said, and I will have you. You will not have me for your slave. You shall have me for your master. I will have you. I have a den, whither I will drag you. You will follow me. You will be obliged to follow me, or I will deliver you up. You must die, my beauty, or be mine. Belong to the priest, belong to the apostate, belong to the assassin. This very night, do you hear?  His eyes sparkled with impurity and rage. His lewd lips reddened the young girl's neck. She struggled in his arms. He covered her with furious kisses. Do not bite me, monster! She cried, Oh, the foul odious monk, leave me!  He reddened, turned pale, then released her and gazed at her with a gloomy air.  He gave vent to a horrible cry, like the wretch to whom a hot iron is applied. Die, then, he said, gnashing his teeth. She saw his terrible look and tried to fly. He caught her once more, he shook her, he flung her on the ground, and walked with rapid strides towards the corner of the tour Roland, dragging her after him along the pavement by her beautiful hands. On arriving there he turned to her. For the last time, will you be mine? She replied, with emphasis, No! Then he cried in a loud voice, Gudule, Gudule, here is the gypsy! Take your vengeance! The young girl felt herself seized suddenly by the elbow. She looked. A fleshless arm was stretched from an opening in the wall, and held her like a hand of iron. Hold her well, said the priest, Tis the gypsy escaped. Release her not. I will go in search of the sergeants. You shall see her hanged. Book 11, Chapter 1, Part 1 Part 2 of Book 11, Chapter 1 of the Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. This Libber Box recording is in the public domain.  Ha! Ha! The gypsy watched the priest retire in the direction of the Pont Notre-Dame. A cavalcade was heard in that direction. The young girl had recognized the spiteful recluse. Panting with terror, she tried to disengage herself. She writhed, she made many starts of agony and despair, but the other held her with incredible strength. The lean and bony fingers which bruised her, clenched on her flesh and met around it. Some would have said that this hand was riveted to her arm. It was more than a chain, more than a fetter, more than a ring of iron. It was a living pair of pincers endowed with intelligence which emerged from the wall. She fell back against the wall exhausted, and then the fear of death took possession of her. She thought of the beauty of life, of youth, of the view of heaven, the aspects of nature, of her love for Phoebus, of all that was vanishing and all that was approaching, of the priest who was denouncing her, of the headsman who was to come, of the gallows which was there. Then she felt terror mount to the very roots of her hair, and she heard the mocking laugh of the recluse saying to her in a very low tone, Ha, ha, ha! You are to be hanged! She turned a dying look towards the window, and she beheld the fierce face of the sacked nun through the bars. What have I done to you? She said, almost lifeless. The recluse did not reply, but began to mumble with a sing-song irritated mocking intonation. Da-ter-of-Egypt, Da-ter-of-Egypt, Da-ter-of-Egypt! The unhappy Esmeralda dropped her head beneath her flowing hair, comprehending that it was no human being she had to deal with. All at once the recluse exclaimed, as though the gypsy's question had taken all this time to reach her brain.  Ah! What have you done to me, gypsy?    She went on wildly, kissing something in the dark. Well, do you see, Da-ter-of-Egypt, they took my child from me.  They ate my child. That is what you have done to me. The young girl replied like a lamb. Alas, perchance, I was not born then. Oh, yes! Return the recluse. You must have been born. You were among them. She would be the same age as you. So I have been here fifteen years. Fifteen years have I suffered. Fifteen years have I prayed.  I tell you that, twice the gypsies who stole her from me, do you hear that? Who ate her with their teeth. Have you a heart?  It is so innocent a thing. Well, that, that is what they took from me, what they killed. The good God knows it well. Today it is my turn.  Oh, I would bite you well if the bars did not prevent me. My head is too large. Poor little one, while she was asleep. And if they woke her up when they took her, in vain she might cry, I was not there. Ah, gypsy mothers, you devoured my child. Come see your own. Then she began to laugh or to gnash her teeth, for the two things resembled each other in that furious face. The day was beginning to dawn, and ashy gleam dimly lighted the scene, and the gallows grew more and more distinct in the square. On the other side, in the direction of the bridge of Notre-Dame, the poor condemned girl fancied that she heard the sound of cavalry approaching. Madam, she cried, clasping her hands and falling on her knees, disheveled, distracted, mad with fright. Madam, have pity, they are coming, I have done nothing to you.   Let me make my escape, release me, mercy. I do not wish to die like that. Give me back my child, said the recluse.  Release me in the name of heaven. Give me back my child. Again the young girl fell, exhausted, broken, and having already the glassy eye of a person in the grave. The glass, she faltered, you seek your child, I seek my parents. Give me back my little Agnes, pursued Goudalé. You do not know where she is? Then die, I will tell you.  It was the gypsies.  When your mother, the gypsy, comes to reclaim you, I shall say to her, Mother, look at that gibbet, or give me back my child. Do you know where she is, my little daughter? Stay, I will show you. Here is her shoe, all that is left to me of her. Do you know where its mate is? If you know, tell me, and if it is only at the other end of the world, I will crawl to it on my knees. As she spoke thus, with her other arm extended through the window, she showed the gypsy the little embroidered shoe. It was already light enough to distinguish its shape and its colors. Let me see that shoe, said the gypsy, quivering. God, God! And at the same time, with her hand which was at liberty, she quickly opened the little bag ornamented with green glass, which she wore about her neck.  All at once she stopped short, trembled in every limb, and cried in a voice which proceeded from the very depths of her being. My daughter! The gypsy had just drawn from the bag a little shoe, absolutely similar to the other. To this little shoe was attached a parchment on which was inscribed this charm. Qu'en les parales retrovarais, tu m'as t'attendra les bras. When thou shalt find its mate, thy mother will stretch out her arms to thee. Quicker than a flash of lightning, the recluse had laid the two shoes together, had read the parchment, and had put close to the bars of the window her face beaming with celestial joy as she cried, My daughter! My daughter! My mother!" said the gypsy. Here we are unequal to the task of depicting the scene. The wall and the iron bars were between them. Oh! The wall! cried the recluse. Oh! To see her and not to embrace her! Your hand! Your hand! The young girl passed her arm through the opening. The recluse threw herself on that hand, pressed her lips to it, and there remained, buried in that kiss, giving no other sign of life than a sob which heaved her breast from time to time. In the meanwhile she wept in torrents, in silence, in the dark, like a rain at night. The poor mother poured out in floods upon that adored hand the dark and deep well of tears which lay within her, and into which her grief had filtered, drop by drop, for fifteen years. All at once she rose, flung aside her long gray hair from her brow, and without uttering a word began to shake the bars of her cage cell, with both hands, more furiously than a lioness. The bars held firm. Then she went to seek in the corner of her cell a huge paving-stone, which served as her pillow, and launched it against them with such violence that one of the bars broke, emitting thousands of sparks. A second blow completely shattered the old iron cross which barricaded the window. Then with her two hands she finished breaking and removing the rusted stumps of the bars. There are moments when woman's hands possess superhuman strength. A passage broken less than a minute was required for her to seize her daughter by the middle of her body and draw her into the cell. Come, let me draw you out of the abyss," she murmured. When her daughter was inside the cell she laid her gently on the ground, then raised her up again, and bearing her in her arms as though she was still only her little agnes, she walked to and fro in her little room, intoxicated, frantic, joyous, crying out, singing, bursting her daughter, talking to her, bursting into laughter, melting into tears, all at once and with vehemence. "'My daughter, my daughter,' she said. "'I have my daughter. Here she is. The good God has given her back to me.  Is there anyone there to see that I have my daughter? Lord Jesus, how beautiful she is! You have made me wait fifteen years, my good God, but it was in order to give her back to me beautiful. Then the gypsies did not eat her. Who said so?  I love the gypsies. It is really you. That was what made my heart leap every time that you passed by. And I took that for hatred. Forgive me, my Agnes, forgive me. You thought me very malicious, did you not? I love you. Have you still the little mark on your neck? Let us see." "'She still has it. Oh, you are beautiful. It was I who gave you those big eyes, mademoiselle. Kiss me. I love you. It is nothing to me that other mothers have children. I scorn them now. They have only to come and see. There is mine. See her neck, her eyes, her hair, her hands. Find me anything as beautiful as that. Oh, I promise you she will have lovers, that she will. I have wept for fifteen years. All my beauty has departed and has fallen to her. Kiss me." She addressed her to a thousand other extravagant remarks whose accent constituted her soul beauty, disarranged the poor girl's garments, even to the point of making her blush, smooth her silky hair with her hand, kissed her foot, her knee, her brow, her eyes, was in raptures over everything. The young girl let her have her way, repeating at intervals and very low and with infinite tenderness. "'My mother!' "'Do you see, my little girl?' resumed the recluse, interspersing her words with kisses. "'I shall love you dearly. We will go away from here. We are going to be very happy. I have inherited something in Rhymes, in our country. You know Rhymes? Ah, no, you do not know it. You were too small. If you only knew how pretty you were at the age of four months. Tiny feet, that people came even from Epernais, which a seven leagues away to see. We shall have a field, a house. I will put you to sleep in my bed. My God! My God! Who would believe this? I have my daughter!' "'Oh, my mother!' said the young girl, at length finding strength to speak in her emotion. The gypsy woman told me so. There was a good gypsy of our band who died last year, who has always cared for me like a nurse. It was she who placed this little bag about my neck. She always said to me, little one, guard this jewel well, tis a treasure. It will cause thee to find thy mother once again, thou wearest thy mother about thy neck.' The gypsy predicted it. The sacked nun again pressed her daughter in her arms.  You say that prettily. And we are in the country.  We certainly owe that to the good holy virgin. What a pretty voice you have. When you spoke to me just now, it was music. Ah, my Lord God, I have found my child again. But is this story credible? Nothing will kill one, or I should have died of joy.'  At that moment the cell resounded with the clang of arms and the galloping of horses, which seemed to be coming from the pot in Notre-Dame, amid advancing farther and farther along the quay. The gypsy threw herself with anguish into the arms of the sacked nun. "'Save me, save me, mother. They are coming.' "'Oh, heaven, what are you saying? I had forgotten. They are in pursuit of you. What have you done?' "'I know not,' replied the unhappy child, but I am condemned to die.' "'To die,' said Goudalé, staggering as though struck by lightning. "'To die!' she repeated slowly, gazing at her daughter with staring eyes. "'Yes, mother,' replied the frightened young girl, "'They want to kill me. They are coming to seize me. That gallows is for me. Save me, save me. They are coming. Save me!'' The recluse remained for several moments motionless and petrified. Then she moved her head in a sign of doubt, and suddenly giving vent to a burst of laughter, but with that terrible laugh which had come back to her. "'Oh, oh, no! It is a dream of which you are telling me. Ah, yes, I lost her, that lasted fifteen years, and then I found her again, and that lasted a minute, and they would take her from me again. And now, when she is beautiful, when she is grown up, when she speaks to me, when she loves me, it is now that they would come to devour her before my very eyes, and I, her mother. Oh, no! These things are not possible. The good God does not permit such things as that!' Here the calvocate appeared to halt, and a voice was heard to say in the distance, "'This way, Mr. Tristan, the priest says that we shall find her at the rat-hole!' The noise of the horses began again. The recluse sprang to her feet with a shriek of despair. "'Fly! Fly, my child! All comes back to me!  It is your death! Horror! Maledictions! Fly!' She thrust her head through the window and withdrew it again hastily. "'Remain!' she said in a low, curt and lugubrious tone, as she pressed the hand of the gypsy, who was more dead than alive. "'Remain! Do not breathe. There are soldiers everywhere. You cannot get out. It is too light!' Her eyes were dry and burning. She remained silent for a moment, but she paced the cell hurriedly, and halted now and then to pluck out handfuls of her gray hairs, which she afterwards tore with her teeth. Suddenly she said, "'They draw near. I shall speak with them. Hide yourself in this corner. They will not see you. I will tell them that you have made your escape, that I released you in faith!' She set her daughter down, for she was still carrying her, in one corner of the cell which was not visible from without.  And when this was finished she became more tranquil and knelt down to pray. The day which was only dawning still left many shadows in the rat-hole. At that moment the voice of the priest, that infernal voice, passed very close to the cell, crying, "'This way, Captain Phoebus de Chateau-Pay!' At that name, at that voice, La Esmeralda, crouching in her corner, made a movement, "'Do not stir!' said Goudoulay. She had barely finished when a tumult of men, swords, and horses halted around the cell. The mother rose quickly and went to post herself before her window, in order to stop it up. She beheld a large troupe of armed men, both horse and foot, drawn up on the grave. The commander dismounted and came to order. "'Old woman!' said this man, who had an atrocious face. We are in search of a witch to hang her. We were told that you had her.' The poor mother assumed as indifferent an air as she could, and replied, "'I know not what you mean.' The other resumed, "'Tet-deux! What was it that frightened Archdeacon said? Where is he?' "'Monsignor,' said a soldier, he has disappeared. "'Come now, old madwoman!' began the commander again. Do not lie. A sorceress was given in charge to you. What have you done with her?' The recluse did not wish to deny all, for fear of awakening suspicion, and replied in a sincere and surly tone, "'If you are speaking of a big young girl who was put into my hands a while ago, I will tell you that she bit me and that I released her. There, leave me in peace.' The commander made a grimace of disappointment. "'Don't lie to me, old Spector,' said he. "'My name is Tristan Lammate, and I am the king's gossip. Tristan the Hermit, do you hear?' he added as he glanced at the plaster-grave around him. "'Tis a name which has an echo here.' "'You might be Satan the Hermit,' replied Goudelet, who was regaining hope, "'but I should have nothing else to say to you, and I should never be afraid of you.' "'Tedue,' said Tristan, "'here is a crone.' Ah! So the witch-girl hath fled. And in which direction did she go?' Goudelet replied in a careless tone. Through the rude de manteau, I believe.' Tristan turned his head and made a sign to his troop to prepare to set out on the march again. The recluse breathed freely once more. "'Monsignor,' suddenly said an archer, "'ask the old elf why the bars of her window are broken in this manner.' This question brought anguish again to the heart of the miserable mother. Nevertheless she did not lose all presence of mind. "'They have always been thus,' she stammered. "'Bah!' retorted the archer. "'Only yesterday they still formed a fine black cross which inspired devotion.' Tristan cast a side-long glance at the recluse. "'I think the old dame is getting confused.' The unfortunate woman felt that all depended on her self-possession. And although with death in her soul she began to grin, mothers possessed such strength. "'Bah!' said she. "'The man is drunk, tis more than a year since the tale of a stone-cart dashed against my window and broke in the grading. And how I cursed the carter, too.' "'Tis true,' said another archer. "'I was there. "'Always and everywhere people are to be found who have seen everything. This unexpected testimony from the archer re-encouraged the recluse, whom this interrogatory was forcing to cross an abyss on the edge of a knife. But she was condemned to a perpetual alternative of hope and alarm. "'If it was a cart which did it,' retorted the first soldier, "'the stomps of the bar should be thrust inwards, while they actually are pushed outwards.' "'Oh, ho!' said Tristan to the soldier. "'You have the nose of an inquisitor of the Châtelet!' Reply to what he says, old woman.' "'Good heavens!' she exclaimed, driven to bay, and in a voice that was full of tears, in despite of her efforts. "'I swear to you, Monsignor, that was a cart which broke those bars. You heard the man who saw it. And then what has that to do with your gypsy?' "'Hum!' growled Tristan. "'The devil!' went on the soldier, flattered by the provost's praise. These fractures of the iron are perfectly fresh.' Tristan tossed his head. She turned pale. "'How long ago, say, you, did the cart do it?' "'A month. A fortnight, perhaps, Monsignor. I know not.' "'She first said, more than a year,' observed the soldier. "'That is suspicious,' said the provost.' "'Monsignor,' she cried, still pressed against the opening, and trembling, last suspicion should lead them to thrust their heads through and look into her cell. "'Monsignor, I swear to you, that was a cart which broke this grating. I swear it to you by the angels of Paradise. If it was not a cart, may I be eternally damned, and I reject God.' "'You put a great deal of heat into that oath,' said Tristan, with his inquisitorial glance. The poor woman felt her assurance vanishing more and more. She had reached the point of blundering, and she comprehended with terror that she was saying what she ought not to have said. Here another soldier came up, crying. "'Monsignor, the old hag lies. The sorceress did not flee through the Rue de Motin. The street chain has remained stretched all night, and the chain-guard has seen no one pass.' Tristan, whose face became more sinister with every moment, addressed the recluse. "'What have you to say to that?' She tried to make head against this new incident. "'That I do not know, Monsignor, that I may have been mistaken. I believe, in fact, that she crossed the water.' "'That is in the opposite direction,' said the provost, and it is not very likely that she would wish to re-enter the city where she was being pursued. You are lying, old woman!' "'And then,' added the first soldier, there is no boat either on this side of the stream or on the other.' "'She swam across,' replied the recluse, defending her ground foot by foot. "'Do women swim?' said the soldier. "'Ted dear, old woman, you are lying,' repeated Tristan angrily. "'I have a good mind to abandon that sorceress and take you. A quarter of an hour of torture will, per chance, draw the truth from your throat. Come, you are to follow us.' She seized on these words with avidity. "'As you please, Monsignor. Do it, do it, torture. I am willing. Take me away. Quick, quick! Let us set out at once.' "'During that time,' she said to herself, my daughter will make her escape. "'Stef!' said the provost. What an appetite for the rack! I understand, not this mad woman at all!' An old gray-haired sergeant of the guard stepped out of the ranks and addressing the provost. "'Mad and sooth, Monsignor. If she released the gypsy, it was not her fault, for she loves not the gypsies. I have been of the watch these fifteen years, and I hear her every evening cursing the Bohemian women with endless implications. If the one of whom we are in pursuit is, as I suppose, the little dancer with the goat, she detests that one, above all the rest.' Goudelet made an effort and said, "'That one, above all!' The unanimous testimony of the men of the watch confirmed the old sergeant's words to the provost. Tristan Le Maté, in despair at extracting anything from the recluse, turned his back on her, and with unspeakable anxiety, she beheld him direct his course slowly towards his horse. "'Come,' he said, between his teeth. March on! Let us set out again on the quest. I shall not sleep until that gypsy is hanged.' But he still hesitated for some time before mounting his horse. Goudelet palpitated between life and death, and as she beheld him cast about the plass that uneasy look of a hunting-dog which instinctively feels that the lair of the beast is close to him and is loath to go away. At length he shook his head and leaped into his saddle. Goudelet's horribly compressed heart now dilated, and she said, in a low voice, as she cast a glance at her daughter whom she had not ventured to look at while they were there. Saved! The poor child had remained all this time in her corner without breathing, without moving, with the idea of death before her. She had lost nothing of the scene between Goudelet and Tristan, and the anguish of her mother had found its echo in her heart. She had heard all the successive snappings of the thread by which she hung suspended over the gulf. Twenty times she had fancied that she saw it break, and at last she began to breathe again and to feel her foot on firm ground. At that moment she heard a voice saying to the provost, Co-bouf, Monsieur le Provo, dis no affair of mine, a man of arms to hang witches. The rabble of the populace is suppressed. I leave you to attend to the matter alone. You will allow me to rejoin my company who are waiting for their captain. The voice was that of Phoebus de Chateaupé, that which took place within her was ineffable. He was there, her friend, her protector, her support, her refuge, her Phoebus. She rose, and before her mother could prevent her, she had rushed to the window crying, Phoebus, aid me, my Phoebus! Phoebus was no longer there. He had just turned the corner of the Rue de la Cotellerie at a gallop. But Tristan had not yet taken his departure. The recluse rushed upon her daughter with a roar of agony. She dragged her violently back, digging her nails into her neck.  But it was too late. Tristan had seen. Eh, eh! he exclaimed with a laugh, which laid bare all his teeth, and made his face resemble the muzzle of a wolf. Too mice in the trap! I suspected as much, said the soldier. Tristan clapped him on the shoulder. You are a good cat. Come, he added, where is Henriet Cousin? A man who had neither the garments nor the eyes of the soldier stepped from the ranks. He wore a costume half-grey, half-brown, flat hair, leather sleeves, and carried a bundle of ropes in his huge hand. This man always attended Tristan, who always attended Louis XI. Friend, said Tristan Larmete, I presume that this is the sorceress of whom we are in search. You will hang me this one. Have you your ladder? There is one yonder, under the shed of the pillar-house, replied the man. Is it on this justice that the thing is to be done, he added, pointing to the stone gibbet? Yes. Oh, eh! continued the man with a huge laugh, which was still more brutal than that of the provost. We shall not have far to go. Make haste, said Tristan, you shall laugh afterwards. In the meantime the recluse had not uttered another word since Tristan had seen her daughter and all hope was lost. She had flung the poor gypsy, half-dead, into the corner of the cellar, and had placed herself once more at the window, with both hands resting on the angle of the sill like two claws. In the next room, Tristan was sitting in the room, with both hands resting on the angle of the sill like two claws. In this attitude she was seen to cast upon all the soldiers her glance, which had become wild and frantic once more. At the moment when Rene Cousin approached her cell, she showed him so savage a face that he shrank back. Monseigneur, he said, returning to the provost, which am I to take? The young one. For the old one, Seamoth difficult. Poor little dancer with the goat, said the old sergeant of the watch. Rene Cousin approached the window again. The mother's eyes made his own droop. He said with a good deal of timidity. Madam! She interrupted him in a very low but furious voice. What do you ask? It is not you, he said, it is the other. What other? The young one. She began to shake her head, crying, There is no one! There is no one! There is no one! Yes, there is, retorted the hangman, and you know it well. Let me take the young one. I have no wish to harm you. She said, with a strange sneer, Ah, so you have no wish to harm me. Let me have the other, madam. T'es Monseigneur the provost who wills it. She repeated with a look of madness, There is no one here. I tell you that there is, replied the executioner. We have all seen that there are two of you. Look then, said the recluse with a sneer, Thrust your head through the window. The executioner observed the mother's fingernails, and dared not. Make haste! shouted Tristan, who had just ranged his troops in a circle round the rat-hole, and who sat on his horse beside the gallows. Rene returned once more to the provost in great embarrassment. He had flung his rope on the ground, and was twisting his hat between his hands with an awkward air. Monseigneur, he asked, where am I to enter? By the door. There is none. By the window. T'es too small. Make it larger! said Tristan angrily. Have you not pickaxes? The mother still looked on steadfastly from the depths of her cavern. She no longer hoped for anything, she no longer knew what she wished, except that she did not wish them to take her daughter. Rene Cousin went in search of the chest of tools for the nightmen under the shed of the pillar-house. He drew from it also the double ladder, which he immediately set up against the gallows. Five or six of the provost's men armed themselves with picks and crowbars, and Tristan betook himself and company with them towards the window. Old woman, said the provost in a severe tone, deliver up to us the girl quietly. She looked at him like one who does not understand. Tet you, continued Tristan, why do you try to prevent this sorceress being hung as it pleases the king? The wretched woman began to laugh in her wild way. Why, she is my daughter! The tone in which she pronounced these words made even Henriette Cousin shudder. I am sorry for that, said the provost, but it is the king's good pleasure. She cried, redoubling her terrible laugh. What is your king to me?  Peers the wall, said Tristan. In order to make a sufficiently wide opening, it suffice to dislodge one course of stone below the window.  Then she began to stride about herself with frightful swiftness, a wild beast's habit which her cage had imparted to her. She no longer said anything, but her eyes flamed. The soldiers were chilled to the very soul. All at once she seized her paving-stone, laughed, and hurled it with both fists upon the workmen. The stone, badly flung, for her hands trembled, touched no one, and fell short under the feet of Tristan's horse. She gnashed her teeth. In the meantime, although the sun had not yet risen, it was broad daylight. A beautiful rose-color enlivened the ancient, decayed chimneys of the Pillar House. It was the hour when the earliest windows of the great city opened joyously on the roofs. Some workmen, a few fruit-sellers on their way to the markets on their asses, began to traverse the greve. They halted for a moment before this group of soldiers clustered round the rat-hole, stared at it with an air of astonishment, and passed on. The recluse had gone and seated herself by her daughter, covering her with her body, in front of her with staring eyes, listening to the poor child who did not stir, but who kept murmuring in a low voice these words only. Feebus! Feebus! In proportion as the work of the demolisher seemed to advance, the mother mechanically retreated and pressed the young girl closer and closer to the wall. All at once the recluse beheld the stone, for she was standing guard and never took her eyes from it, move, and she heard Tristan's voice encouraging the workers. Then she aroused from the depression into which she had fallen during the last few moments, cried out, and as she spoke, her voice now rent the ear like a saw, then stammered, as though all kind of maledictions were pressing to her lips to burst forth at once. Ho, ho, ho! Why, this is terrible! You are ruffians!  Oh, the cowards! Oh, the hangman lackeys! The wretched black-guard assassins! Help! Help! Fire! Will they take my child from me like this? Who is it then who is called the Good God? Then, addressing Tristan, foaming at the mouth, with wild eyes, all bristling and on all fours like a female panther, draw near and take my daughter. Do not you understand that this woman tells you that she is my daughter? Do you know what it is to have a child? Eh, lynx, have you never lain with your female? Have you never had a cub? And if you have little ones, when they howl, have you nothing in your vitals that moves? Throw down the stone, said Tristan. It no longer holds. The crowbars raised the heavy course. It was, as we have said, the mother's last bulwark. She threw herself upon it. She tried to hold it back. She scratched the stone with her nails. But the massive block, said in movement by six men, escaped her and glided gently to the ground along the iron levers. The mother, perceiving and entrance affected, fell down in front of the opening, barricading the breach with her body, beating the pavement with her head, and shrieking with a voice rendered so hoarse by fatigue that it was barely audible. Help! Fire! Fire! Now take the winch, said Tristan, still impassive. The mother gazed at the soldiers in such formidable fashion that they were more inclined to retreat than to advance. Come now, repeated the provost. Here you, René Cousin! No one took a step. The provost swore. Tete de Christ, my men of war, afraid of a woman! Monseigneur, said René, do you call that a woman? She has the mane of a lion, said another. Calm, repeated the provost. The gap is wide enough. Enter three abreast, as at the breach of Pantois. Let us make an end of it. Death of Mahome! I will make two pieces of the first man who draws back! Place between the provost and the mother, both threatening, the soldiers hesitated for a moment, then took their resolution and advanced towards the rat-hole. When the recluse saw this, she rose abruptly on her knees, flung aside her hair from her face, then let her thin, flayed hands fall by her side. Then great tears fell, one by one, from her eyes. They flowed down her cheeks through a furrow, like a torrent through a bed which it has hollowed for itself. At the same time she began to speak, but in a voice so supplicating, so gentle, so submissive, so heart-rending, that more than one old convict warder around Tristan, who must have devoured human flesh, wiped his eyes. Ah, see yours! Miss yours, the sergeants! One word! There is one thing which I must say to you. She is my daughter, do you see? My dear little daughter whom I had lost. Listen, it is quite a history. Consider that I knew the sergeants very well. They were always good to me in the days when the little boys threw stones at me, because I led a life of pleasure. Do you see? You will leave me my child when you know. I was a poor woman of the town. It was the Bohemians who stole her from me. And I kept her shoe for fifteen years. Stay, here it is. That was the kind of foot which she had. That rhymes, la chante fleurie, rueful pain. Perchance you knew about that. It was I. In your youth, then, there was a merry time when one passed good hours. You will take pity on me, will you not, gentlemen? The gypsy stole her from me. They hid her from me for fifteen years. I thought her dead. Fancy, my good friends, believed her to be dead. I have passed fifteen years here in this cellar without a fire in winter.  I have cried so much that the good God has heard me. This night he has given my daughter back to me. It is a miracle of the good God. She was not dead. You will not take her from me, I am sure. If it were myself, I would say nothing. But she, a child of sixteen, leave her time to see the sun. What has she done to you? Nothing at all. Nor have I. If you did but know that she is all I have, that I am old, that she is a blessing which the Holy Virgin has sent to me. And yet you were all so good. You did not know that she was my daughter. But now you do know it. Oh, I love her. Montseur, the grand provost. I would prefer a stab in my own vitals to a scratch on her finger. You have the air of such a good Lord. What have I told you explains the matter, does it not?  Leave me, my child. Consider that I pray you on my knees, as one prays to Jesus Christ. I ask nothing of anyone. I am from Rhymes, gentlemen. I own a little field inherited from my uncle, Mahier Pradhan. I am no beggar. I wish nothing, but I do want my child. Oh, I want to keep my child. The good God, who is the master, has not given her back to me for nothing. The king, you say the king. It would not cause him much pleasure to have my little daughter killed. And then the king is good. She is my daughter. She is my own daughter. She belongs not to the king. She is not yours. I want to go away. We want to go away. And when two women pass, one a mother and the other a daughter, one lets them go. Let us pass. We belong in Rhymes. Oh, you are very good, messieurs the sergeants. I love you all. You will not take my dear little one. It is impossible. It is utterly impossible, is it not? My child, my child. We will not try to give an idea of her gestures, her tone, of the tears which she swallowed as she spoke, of the hands which she clasped and then rung, of the heartbreaking smiles, of the swimming glances, of the groans, the sighs, the miserable and affecting cries which she mingled with her disordered, wild and incoherent words. When she became silent, Tristan Lermete frowned, but it was to conceal a tear which welled up in his tiger's eye. He conquered this weakness, however, and said in a curred tone, The King wills it. Then he bent down to the ear of Rene Cousin and said to him in a very low tone, Make an end of it quickly. Possibly the redoubtable provost felt his heart also failing him. The executioner and the sergeants entered the cell. The mother offered no resistance. Only she dragged herself towards her daughter and threw herself bodily upon her. The gypsy beheld the soldier's approach. The horror of death reanimated her. Mother! she shrieked in a tone of indescribable distress. Mother! They are coming! Defend me! Yes, my love, I am defending you! Replied the mother in a dying voice, and clasping her closely in her arms, she covered her with kisses. The two lying thus on the earth, the mother upon the daughter, presented a spectacle worthy of pity. Rene Cousin grasped the young girl by the middle of her body, beneath her beautiful shoulders. When she felt that hand she cried, You! and fainted. The executioner, who was shedding large tears upon her, drop by drop, was about to bear her away in his arms. She tried to detach the mother, who had, so to speak, nodded her hands around her daughter's waist. But she clung so strongly to her child, that it was impossible to separate them. Then Rene Cousin dragged the young girl outside the cell, and the mother after her. The mother's eyes were also closed. At that moment the sun rose, and there was already on the plaza a fairly numerous assembly of people who looked on from a distance at what was being thus dragged along the pavement to the gibbet. For that was Provost Tristan's way at executions. He had a passion for preventing the approach of the curious. There was no one at the windows. Only at a distance, at the summit of that one of the towers of Notre-Dame which commands the Greve, two men outlined in black against the light morning sky who seemed to be looking on were visible. Rene Cousin paused at the foot of the fatal ladder, with that which he was dragging and barely breathing, with so much pity did the thing inspire him he passed the rope around the lovely neck of the young girl. The unfortunate child felt the horrible touch of the hemp. She raised her eyelids and saw the fleshless arm of the stone gallows extended above her head. Then she shook herself and shrieked in a loud and heart-rending voice. No! No! I will not! Her mother, whose head was buried and concealed in her daughter's garments, said not a word. Only her whole body could be seen to quiver, and she was heard to redouble her kisses on her child. The executioner took advantage of this moment to hastily loose the arms with which she clasped the condemned girl. Either through exhaustion or despair she let him have his way. Then he took the young girl on his shoulder from which the charming creature hung gracefully bent over his large head. Then he set his foot on the ladder in order to ascend. At that moment the mother, who was crouching on the pavement, opened her eyes wide. Without uttering a cry, she raised herself erect with a terrible expression. Then she flung herself upon the hand of the executioner like a beast on its prey and bit it. It was done like a flash of lightning. The headsmen howled with pain. Those nearby rushed up. With difficulty they withdrew his bleeding hand from the mother's teeth. She preserved a profound silence. They thrust her back with much brutality and noticed that her head fell heavily on the pavement. They raised her, she fell back again. She was dead. The executioner, who had not loosed his hold on the young girl, began to ascend the ladder once more. End of book 11, chapter 1 Book 11, chapter 2 of the Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Book 11, chapter 2 The Beautiful Creature Clad in White When Quasimodo saw that the cell was empty, that the gypsy was no longer there, that while he had been defending her she had been abducted, he grasped his hair with both hands and stamped with surprise and pain. Then he set out to run through the entire church seeking his Bohemian, howling strange cries to all the corners of the walls, strewing his red hair on the pavement. It was just at the moment when the king's archers were making their victorious entrance into Notre-Dame, also in search of the gypsy. Quasimodo, poor deaf fellow, aided them in their fatal intentions without suspecting it. He thought that the outcasts were the gypsies' enemies, he himself conducted Tristan Larmate to all possible hiding-places, open to him the secret doors, the double bottoms of the altars, the rear sacristries. If the unfortunate girl had still been there, it would have been he himself who would have delivered her up. When the fatigue of finding nothing had disheartened Tristan, who was not easily discouraged, Quasimodo continued the search alone. He made the tour of the church twenty times, length and breadth, up and down, ascending and descending, running, calling, shouting, peeping, rummaging, ransacking, thrusting his head into every hole, pushing a torch under every vault, despairing, mad. A male who has lost his female is no more roaring nor more haggard. At last, when he was sure, perfectly sure, that she was no longer there, that all was at an end, that she had been snatched from him, he slowly mounted the staircase to the towers, that staircase which he had ascended with so much eagerness and triumph on the day when he had saved her. He passed those same places once more with drooping head, voiceless, tearless, almost breathless. The church was again deserted and had fallen back into its silence. The archers had quitted it to track the sorceress in the city. Quasimodo left alone in that vast Notre-Dame, so besieged and tumultuous but a short time before, once more but took himself to the cell where the gypsy had slept for so many weeks under his guardianship. As he approached it, he fancied that he might, perhaps, find her there. When, at the turn of the gallery which opens on the roof of the side aisles, he perceived the tiny cell with its little window and its little door crouching beneath the great flying buttress, like a bird's nest under a branch, the poor man's heart failed him, and he leaned against a pillar to keep from falling. He imagined that she might have returned thither, that some good genius had, no doubt, brought her back, that this chamber was too tranquil, too safe, too charming for her not to be there, and he dared not take another step for fear of destroying his illusion. Yes, he said to himself, perchance, she is sleeping, or praying, I must not disturb her. At length he summoned up courage, advanced on tiptoe, looked, entered. Empty. The cell was still empty. The unhappy deaf man walked slowly round it, lifted the bed and looked beneath it, as though she might be concealed between the pavement and the mattress. Then he shook his head and remained stupefied. All at once he crushed his torch under his foot, and without uttering a word, without giving vent to a sigh, he flung himself at full speed, head foremost against the wall, and fell fainting on the floor. When he recovered his senses, he threw himself on the bed and rolled about. He kissed frantically the place where the young girl had slept and which was still warm. He remained there for several moments as motionless as though he were about to expire.   He dragged himself on his knees outside the cell and crouched down facing the door in an attitude of astonishment. He remained thus for more than an hour without making a movement, with his eye fixed on the deserted cell, more gloomy and more pensive than a mother seated between an empty cradle and a full coffin. He uttered not a word. Only at long intervals a sob heaved his body violently, but it was a tearless sob, like summer lightning which makes no noise. It appears to have been then that, seeking at the bottom of his lonely thoughts for the unexpected abductor of the gypsy, he thought of the arch-deacon. He remembered that Dom Claude alone possessed a key to the staircase leading to the cell. He recalled his nocturnal attempts on the young girl, in the first of which he, Quasimodo, had assisted, the second of which he had prevented. He recalled a thousand details, and soon he no longer doubted that the arch-deacon had taken the gypsy. Nevertheless such was his respect for the priest, such his gratitude, his devotion, his love for this man had taken such deep root in his heart that they resisted even at this moment the talons of jealousy and despair. He reflected that the arch-deacon had done this thing, and the wrath of blood and death which it would have evoked in him against any other person turned in the poor deaf man from the moment when Claude Frollo was in question into an increase of grief and sorrow. At the moment when his thought was thus fixed upon the priest, while daybreak was whitening the flying buttresses, he perceived, on the highest story of Notre-Dame, at the angle formed by the external balustrade as it makes the turn of the chancel, a figure walking. This figure was coming towards him. He recognized it. It was the arch-deacon. Claude was walking with a slow grave-step. He did not look before him as he walked. He was directing his course towards the northern tower, but his face was turned aside towards the right bank of the Seine, and he held his head high, as though trying to see something over the roofs. The owl often assumes this oblique attitude. It flies towards one point and looks towards another. In this manner the priest passed above Quasimodo without seeing him. The deaf man, who had been petrified by this sudden apparition, beheld him disappear through the door of the staircase to the north tower. The reader is aware that this is the tower from which the Hotel de Vie is visible. Quasimodo rose and followed the arch-deacon. Quasimodo ascended the tower staircase for the sake of ascending it, for the sake of seeing why the priest was ascending it. Moreover, the poor bell-ringer did not know what he, Quasimodo, should do, what he should say, what he wished.  The arch-deacon and the gypsy had come into conflict in his heart. When he reached the summit of the tower, before emerging from the shadow of the staircase and stepping upon the platform, he cautiously examined the position of the priest. The priest's back was turned to him. There is an open balustrade which surrounds the platform of the bell tower. The priest, whose eyes looked down upon the town, was resting his breast on that one of the four sides of the balustrades which looks upon the Ponte Notre-Dame. Quasimodo, advancing with the tread of a wolf behind him, went to see what he was gazing at thus. The priest's attention was so absorbed elsewhere that he did not hear the deaf man walking behind him. Paris is a magnificent and charming spectacle, and especially at that day viewed from the top of the towers of Notre-Dame in the fresh light of a summer dawn. The day might have been in July. The sky was perfectly serene. Some tardy stars were fading away at various points, and there was a very brilliant one in the east in the brightest part of the heavens. The sun was about to appear. Paris was beginning to move. A very white and very pure light brought out vividly to the eye all the outlines that its thousands of houses present to the east. The giant shadow of the towers leaped from roof to roof, from one end of the great city to the other. There were several quarters from which were already heard voices and noisy sounds. Here the stroke of a bell, there the stroke of a hammer, beyond the complicated clatter of a cart in motion. Already several columns of smoke were being belched forth from the chimney scattered over the whole surface of roofs, as through the fissures of an immense sulfurous crater. The river, which ruffles its waters against the arches of so many bridges, against the points of so many islands, was wavering with silvery folds. Around the city, outside the ramparts, sight was lost in a great circle of fleecy vapours through which one confusedly distinguished the indefinite line of the plains and the graceful swell of the heights. All sorts of floating sounds were dispersed over this half-awakened city. Towards the east the morning breeze chased a few soft white bits of wool torn from the misty fleece of the hills. In the Parví some good women, who had their milk jugs in their hands, were pointing out to each other with astonishment the singular dilapidation of the great door of Notre-Dame, and the two solidified streams of lead in the crevices of the stone. This was all that remained of the tempest of the night. The bonfire lighted between the towers by Quasimodo had died out. Tristan had already cleared up the plass, and had the dead thrown into the Sain. Kings, like Louis XI, are careful to clean the pavement quickly after a massacre. Outside, the balustrade of the tower, directly under the point where the priest had paused, there was one of those fantastically carved stone gutters with which Gothic edifice is bristle, and in a crevice of that gutter two pretty wallflowers emblazom, shaken out and vivified as it were, by the breath of air made frolicsome salutations to each other. Above the towers, on high, far away in the depths of the sky, the cries of little birds were heard. But the priest was not listening to, was not looking at, anything of all of this. He was one of the men for whom there were no mornings, no birds, no flowers. In that immense horizon, which assumed so many aspects about him, his contemplation was concentrated on a single point. Quasimodo was burning to ask him what he had done with the gypsy, but the Archdeacon seemed to be out of the world at that moment. He was evidently in one of those violent moments of life when one would not feel the earth crumble. He remained motionless and silent, with his eyes steadily fixed on a certain point. There was something so terrible about his silence and immobility that the savage bell-ringer shuddered before it, and dared not come in contact with it. Only, and this was also one way of interrogating the Archdeacon, he followed the direction of his vision, and in this way the glance of the unhappy death-man fell upon the Place de Grave. Thus he saw what the priest was looking at. The latter was erected near the permanent gallows. There were some people and many soldiers in the Place. A man was dragging a white thing from which hung something black along the pavement. This man halted at the foot of the gallows. Here something took place which Quasimodo could not see very clearly. It was not because his only eye had not preserved its long range, but there was a group of soldiers which prevented his seeing everything. Moreover at that moment the sun appeared, and such a flood of light overflowed the horizon that one would have said that all the points in Paris, spires, chimneys, gables, had simultaneously taken fire. Meanwhile the man began to mount the latter. Then Quasimodo saw him again distinctly. He was carrying a woman on his shoulder, a young girl dressed in white. That young girl had a noose about her neck. Quasimodo recognized her. It was she. The man reached the top of the latter. There he arranged the noose. Here the priest, in order to see the better, knelt upon the balustrade. All at once the man kicked away the latter abruptly, and Quasimodo, who had not breathed for several moments, beheld the unhappy child dangling at the end of the rope two fathoms above the pavement, with the man squatting on her shoulders. The rope made several gyrations on itself, and Quasimodo beheld horrible convulsions run along the gypsy's body. The priest, on his side, without stretched neck and eyes starting from his head, contemplated this horrible group of the man and the young girl, the spider and the fly. At the moment when it was most horrible, the laugh of a demon, a laugh which one could only give vent to when one is no longer human, burst forth on the priest's livid face. Quasimodo did not hear that laugh, but he saw it. The bell-ringer retreated several paces behind the arch-deacon, and suddenly hurling himself upon him with fury, with his huge hands he pushed him by the back over into the abyss over which Dom Claude was leaning. The priest shrieked, damnation! and fell. The spout, above which he had stood, arrested him in his fall. He clung to it with desperate hands, and at the moment when he opened his mouth to utter a second cry he beheld the formidable and avenging face of Quasimodo thrust over the edge of the balustrade above his head. Then he was silent. The abyss was there below him, a fall of more than two hundred feet and the pavement. In this terrible situation the arch-deacon said not a word, uttered not a groan. He merely writhed upon the spout with incredible efforts to climb up again, but his hands had no hold on the granite. His feet slid along the blackened wall without catching fast. People who have ascended the towers of Notre-Dame know that there's a swell of the stone immediately beneath the balustrade. It was on this retreating angle that miserable arch-deacon exhausted himself. He had not to deal with a perpendicular wall, but with one which sloped away beneath him. Quasimodo had but to stretch out his hand in order to draw him from the gulf, but he did not even look at him. He was looking at the greve. He was looking at the gallows. He was looking at the gypsy. The deaf man was leaning with his elbows on the balustrade at the spot where the arch-deacon had been a moment before, and there never detaching his gaze from the only object which existed for him in the world at that moment. He remained motionless and mute, like a man struck by lightning and a long stream of tears flowed in silence from that eye which, up to that time, had never shed but one tear. Meanwhile the arch-deacon was panting. His bald brow was dripping with perspiration. His nails were bleeding against the stones. His knees were flayed by the wall.  To complete his misfortune, this spout ended in a leaden pipe which bent under the weight of his body. The arch-deacon felt this pipe slowly giving away. The miserable man said to himself that when his hand should be worn out with fatigue, when his cassock should tear asunder, when the lead should give way, he would be obliged to fall, and terror seized upon his very vitals. Now and then he glanced wildly at a sort of narrow shelf, formed ten feet lower down by projections of the sculpture, and he prayed heaven from the depths of his distressed soul that he might be allowed to finish his life were to last two centuries on that space two feet square. Once he glanced below him into the plos, into the abyss, the head which he raised again had its eyes closed and its hair standing erect. There was something frightful in the silence of these two men, while the arch-deacon agonized in this terrible fashion a few feet below him, Quasimodo wept and gazed at the grave. The arch-deacon, seeing that all his exertions served only to weaken the fragile support which remained to him, decided to remain quiet. There he hung, embracing the gutter, hardly breathing, no longer stirring, making no longer any other movements than that mechanical convulsion of the stomach which one experiences in dreams when one fancies himself falling. His fixed eyes were wide open with a stare. He lost ground, little by little. Nevertheless his fingers slipped along the spout. He became more and more conscious of the feebleness of his arms and the weight of his body. The curve of lead which sustained him inclined more and more each instant towards the abyss. He beheld below him a frightful thing, the roof of Saint-Jean-Lérand, as small as a card folded in two. He gazed at the impressive carvings, one by one, of the tower, suspended like himself over the precipice, but without terror for themselves or pity for him. All was stone around him, before his eyes gaping monsters, below, quite at the bottom, in the place, the pavement, above his head, Quasimodo weeping. In the parvie there were several groups of curious good people, who were tranquilly seeking to divine who the madman could be, who was amusing himself in so strange a manner. The priest heard them saying, for their voices reached him, clear and shrill, why, he will break his neck! Quasimodo wept. At last the arch-deacon, foaming with rage and despair, understood that all was in vain. Nevertheless he collected all the strength which remained to him for a final effort. He stiffened himself upon the spout, pushed against the wall with both his knees, clung to a crevice in the stones with his hands, and succeeded in climbing back with one foot perhaps. But this effort made the leaden beak on which he rested bend abruptly. His cassock burst open at the same time. Then, feeling everything give way beneath him, with nothing but his stiffened and failing hands to support him, the unfortunate man closed his eyes and let go of the spout. He fell. Quasimodo watched him fall. A fall from such a height is seldom perpendicular. The arch-deacon, launched into space, fell at first head foremost, without spread hands. Then he whirled over and over many times. The wind blew him upon the roof of a house, where the unfortunate man began to break up. Nevertheless he was not dead when he reached there. The bell-ringer saw him still endeavour to cling to a gable with his nails, but the surface sloped too much and he had no more strength. He slid rapidly along the roof like a loose and tile and dashed upon the pavement. There he no longer moved. Then Quasimodo raised his eyes to the gypsy, whose body he beheld hanging from the gibbet, quivering far away beneath her white robe with the last shudderings of anguish. Then he dropped them on the arch- deacon, stretched out at the base of the tower and no longer retaining the human form. And he said, with a sob which heaved his deep chest, Oh, all that I have ever loved! CHAPTER III Towards evening on that day, when the judiciary officers of the bishop came to pick up from the pavement of the Parvi, the dislocated corpse of the arch- deacon, Quasimodo, had disappeared. A great many rumours were in circulation with regard to this adventure. No one doubted but that the day had come when, in accordance with their compact, Quasimodo, that is to say the devil, was to carry off Claude Frollo, that is to say the sorcerer. It was presumed that he had broken the body when taking the soul, like monkeys who break the shell to get at the nut. This is why the arch- deacon was not interred in consecrated earth. Louis XI died a year later, in the month of August 1483. As for Pierre Gringoire, he succeeded in saving the goat, and he won success in tragedy. It appears that, after having tasted astrology, philosophy, architecture, hermetics, all vanities he returned to tragedy, the vainest pursuit of all. This is what he called coming to a tragic end. This is what is to be read on the subject of his dramatic triumphs in 1483 in the accounts of the ordinary. To Jehan Marchant and Pierre Gringoire, carpenter and composer, who have made and composed the mystery made at the Châtelet of Paris at the entry of Montseur-de-Legate, and have ordered the personages, clothed and dressed the same, as in the said mystery was required, and likewise, for having made the scaffoldings there too necessary, and for this deed, one hundred leavers. Phoebus de Châtapay also came to a tragic end. He married. Chapter 4 The Marriage of Quasimodo We have just said that Quasimodo disappeared from Notre-Dame on the day of the Gypsies and of the Archdeacon's death. He was not seen again, in fact, no one knew what had become of him. During the night which followed the execution of La Asmerelda, the nightmen had detached her body from the gibbet, and had carried it, according to custom, to the cellar of Montfosson. Montfosson was, as Soval says, the most ancient and the most superb gibbet in the kingdom. Between the far bergs of the temple and Saint-Martin, about a hundred and sixty toise from the walls of Paris, a few bow shots from La Quartier, there was to be seen on the crest of a gentle, almost imperceptible eminence, but sufficiently elevated to be seen for several leagues round about, an edifice of strange form, bearing considerable resemblance to a Celtic Cromlec, and from where also human sacrifices were offered. Let the reader picture to himself crowning a limestone hillock an oblong mass of masonry, fifteen feet in height, thirty wide, forty long, with a gate, an external railing, and a platform. On this platform sixteen enormous pillars of rough-hewn stone, thirty feet in height, arranged in a colonnade round three of the four sides of the mass which support them, bound together at their summits by heavy beams, whence hung chains at intervals. On all these chains, skeletons. In the vicinity, on the plain, a stone cross and two gibbets of secondary importance which seemed to have sprung up as shoots around the central gallows. Above all this, in the sky, a perpetual flock of crows. That was Mont-Fesson. At the end of the fifteenth century, the formidable gibbet which dated from 1328 was already very much dilapidated. The beams were worm-eaten, the chains rusted, the pillars green with mold, the layers of hewn stone were all cracked at their joints, and grass was growing on that platform which no feet touched. The monument made a horrible profile against the sky, especially at night when there was a little moonlight on those white skulls, or when the breeze of evening brushed the chains and the skeletons and swayed all these in the darkness. The presence of this gibbet suffice to render gloomy all the surrounding places. The mass of masonry which served as foundation to the odious edifice was hollow. A huge cellar had been constructed there, closed by an old iron grating which was out of order, into which were cast not only the human remains, which were taken from the chains of Mont-Fesson, but also the bodies of all the unfortunates executed on the other permanent gibbets of Paris. To that deep charnel-house where so many human remains and so many crimes have rotted in company, many great ones of this world, many innocent people, have contributed their bones, from Engaran de Marigny, the first victim, and a just man, to Admiral de Coligny, who was its last, and who was also a just man. As for the mysterious disappearance of Quasimodo, this is all that we have been able to discover. About eighteen months or two years after the events which terminate this story, when search was made in that cavern for the body of Olivier Le Damme, who had been hanged two days previously and to whom Charles VIII had granted the favour of being buried in Saint Laurent in better company, they found among all those hideous carcasses two skeletons, one of which held the other in its embrace. One of these skeletons, which was that of a woman, still had a few strips of a garment which had once been white, and around her neck was to be seen a string of a drazarac beads with a little silk bag ornamented with green glass, which was open and empty. These objects were of so little value that the executioner had probably not cared for them. The other, which held this one in a close embrace, was the skeleton of a man. It was noticed that his spinal column was crooked, his head seated on his shoulder blades, and that one leg was shorter than the other. Moreover, there was no fracture of the vertebrae at the nape of the neck, and it was evident that he had not been hanged. Hence the man to whom it had belonged had come thither and had died there. When they tried to detach the skeleton which he held in his embrace, he fell to dust. The End of The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo