little; does it not?"

"Very much, for I had reason to cling to life."

"Every one has."

"But I above all."

"Then I only know one way."

"Make revelations! never."

"No, but fly with me."

"How! fly with you?"

"Yes, I escape."

"But do you know that our execution is fixed for to-morrow?"

"Therefore I decamp to-night."

"Escape, do you say?"

"Certainly."

"How? where?"

"Open the window."

"Well."

"Shake the middle bar."

"Great God!"

"Does it resist?"

"No, it yields!"

"Very good, it has given me trouble enough, Heaven knows."

"It seems like a dream."

"Do you remember asking me if I did not make holes in anything, like all
the others?"

"Yes, but you replied--"

"That I would tell you another time; was the answer a good one?"

"Excellent; but how to descend?"

"Help me."

"In what?"

"To search my paillasse."

"A ladder of cord!"

"Exactly."

"But how did you get it?"

"I received it with a file in a lark pie the day of my arrival."

"Certainly, you are decidedly a great man."

"I know it; besides that, I am a good man--for I might escape alone."

"And you have thought of me."

"I asked for you, saying that I wished to say adieu to you. I knew I
should entice them to do some act of stupidity."

"Let us make haste, captain."

"On the contrary, let us act slowly and prudently; we have an hour
before us."

"And the sentinels?"

"Bah! it is dark."

"But the moat, which is full of water?"

"It is frozen."

"But the wall?"

"When we are there, will be time enough to think about that."

"Must we fasten the ladder?"

"I want to try if it be solid; I have an affection for my spine, such as
it is, and do not want to break my neck to save it from another fate."

"You are the first captain of the day, La Jonquiere."

"Bah! I have made plenty of others," said La Jonquiere, tying the last
knot in the ladder.

"Is it finished?" asked Gaston.

"Yes."

"Shall I pass first?"

"As you like."

"I like it so."

"Go, then."

"Is it high?"

"Fifteen to eighteen feet."

"A trifle."

"Yes, for you who are young, but it is a different affair for me; be
prudent, I beg."

"Do not be afraid."

Gaston went first, slowly and prudently, followed by La Jonquiere, who
laughed in his sleeve, and grumbled every time he hurt his fingers, or
when the wind shook the cords.

"A nice affair for the successor of Richelieu and Mazarin," he growled
to himself.