im
cut-throat with unquestioned authority.

After the Provost was gone I heard the man's fetters clanking again.
This time he entered to remove my cup and plate, and surprised me by
speaking to me. Maintaining his former sullenness, and scarcely looking
at me, he said abruptly: 'You are going out again?'

I nodded assent.

'Do you remember a bald-faced bay horse that fell with you?' he
muttered, keeping his dogged glance on the floor.

I nodded again.

'I want to sell the horse,' he said. 'There is not such another in
Blois, no, nor in Paris! Touch it on the near hip with the whip and it
will go down as if shot. At other times a child might ride it. It is
in a stable, the third from the Three Pigeons, in the Ruelle Amancy.
Fresnoy does not know where it is. He sent to ask yesterday, but I would
not tell him.'

Some spark of human feeling which appeared in his lowering, brutal
visage as he spoke of the horse led me to desire further information.
Fortunately the little girl appeared at that moment at the door in
search of her play-fellow; and through her I learned that the man's
motive for seeking to sell the horse was fear lest the dealer in whose
charge it stood should dispose of it to repay himself for its keep, and
he, Matthew, lose it without return.

Still I did not understand why he applied to me, but I was well pleased
when I learned the truth. Base as the knave was, he had an affection for
the bay, which had been his only property for six years. Having this
in his mind, he had conceived the idea that I should treat it well, and
should not, because he was in prison and powerless, cheat him of the
price.

In the end I agreed to buy the horse for ten crowns, paying as well what
was due at the stable. I had it in my head to do something also for the
man, being moved to this partly by an idea that there was good in him,
and partly by the confidence he had seen fit to place in me, which
seemed to deserve some return. But a noise below stairs diverted my
attention. I heard myself named, and for the moment forgot the matter.

CHAPTER XXVII. TO ME, MY FRIENDS!

I was impatient to learn who had come, and what was their errand with
me; and being still in that state of exaltation in which we seem to hear
and see more than at other times, I remarked a peculiar lagging in
the ascending footsteps, and a lack of buoyancy, which was quick to
communicate itself to my mind. A vague dread fell upon me as I stood
li