ade, like a coward, after
sending his friends to the foot of the scaffold.

"Oh, the rascals know what they're about!" he muttered. "It's my debt
which they are making my poor old Gilbert pay."

And the terrible tragedy went on.

At seven o'clock in the evening, after a long deliberation, the jury
returned to court and the foreman read out the answers to the questions
put from the bench. The answer was "Yes" to every count of the
indictment, a verdict of guilty without extenuating circumstances.

The prisoners were brought in. Standing up, but staggering and
white-faced, they received their sentence of death.

And, amid the great, solemn silence, in which the anxiety of the
onlookers was mingled with pity, the assize-president asked:

"Have you anything more to say, Vaucheray?"

"Nothing, monsieur le president. Now that my mate is sentenced as well
as myself, I am easy... We are both on the same footing... The governor
must find a way to save the two of us."

"The governor?"

"Yes, Arsene Lupin."

There was a laugh among the crowd.

The president asked:

"And you, Gilbert?"

Tears streamed down the poor lad's cheeks and he stammered a few
inarticulate sentences. But, when the judge repeated his question, he
succeeded in mastering himself and replied, in a trembling voice:

"I wish to say, monsieur le president, that I am guilty of many things,
that's true... I have done a lot of harm... But, all the same, not this.
No, I have not committed murder... I have never committed murder... And
I don't want to die... it would be too horrible..."

He swayed from side to side, supported by the warders, and he was heard
to cry, like a child calling for help:

"Governor... save me!... Save me!... I don't want to die!"

Then, in the crowd, amid the general excitement, a voice rose above the
surrounding clamour:

"Don't be afraid, little 'un!... The governor's here!"

A tumult and hustling followed. The municipal guards and the policemen
rushed into court and laid hold of a big, red-faced man, who was stated
by his neighbours to be the author of that outburst and who struggled
hand and foot.

Questioned without delay, he gave his name, Philippe Bonel, an
undertaker's man, and declared that some one sitting beside him had
offered him a hundred-franc note if he would consent, at the proper
moment, to shout a few words which his neighbour scribbled on a bit of
paper. How could he refuse?

In proof of his state