ut Marise, as the dancers halted and Margot ran,
with fleet steps, toward the bar. "Listen! listen! They come to you,
Margot--Serpice and Gaston. The work is done."

"And before even Clodoche or Von Hetzler have arrived!" she replied
excitedly. "Give them light, give them welcome. Be quick!"

Marise ducked down, loosened the fastenings of the trap-door, flung it
back, and, leaning over the gap with a light in her hand, called down
into the darkness, "Hola! Hola! La! la! loi! Come on, comrades, come
on!"

The caller obeyed instantly. A hand reached up and gripped the edge of
the flooring, and out of the darkness into the light emerged the figure
of a man in a leather cap and the blue blouse of a mechanic. He was a
pale, fox-faced, fox-eyed fellow, with lank, fair hair, a brush of
ragged yellow beard, and the look and air of the sneak and spy indelibly
branded upon him.

It was Cleek.

"Clodoche!" exclaimed Marise, falling back in surprise.

"Clodoche!" echoed Margot. "Clodoche--and from the sewers?"

"Yes--why not?" he answered, his tongue thick-burred with the accent of
Alsace, his shifting eyes flashing toward the huge window behind the
bar, where, in the moonlight, the narrow passage leading down to the
door of "The Twisted Arm" gaped evilly between double rows of scowling,
thief-sheltering houses. "Name of the fiend! Is this the welcome you
give the bringer of fortune, Margot?"

"But from the sewer?" she repeated. "It is incomprehensible, cher ami.
You were to pilot Von Hetzler over from the Cafe Dupin to the square
beyond there"--pointing to the window--"to leave him waiting a moment
while you came on to see if it were safe for him to enter; and now you
come from the sewer, from the opposite direction entirely!"

"Mother of misfortunes! You had done the same yourself--you, Lantier;
you, Clopin; you Cadarousse; any of you, had you been in my boots," he
made answer. "I stole a leaf from your own book, earlier in the evening.
Garrotted a fellow with jewels on him, in the Rue Noir, near the Market
Place, and nearly got into 'the stone bottle' for doing it. He was a
decoy, set there by the police for some of you fellows, and there was a
sergeant de ville after me like a whirlwind. I was not fool enough to
turn the chase in this direction, so I doubled and twisted until it was
safe to dive into the tavern of Fouchard, and lay in hiding there.
Fouchard let his son carry a message to the count for me, and will gui