"Oh! oh!" exclaimed one of the guards, as he came to the light, "how pale you are!"
"Pale!" cried another, "you ought to say livid."
"I!" said the young man, endeavoring to collect his faculties.
"In the name of Heaven! what has happened to you?" exclaimed all voices.
"You have not a drop of blood in your veins, my poor friend," said one of them, laughing.
"Messieurs, it is serious," said another, "he is going to faint; does any one of you happen to have any salts?" And they all laughed.
All these interpellations, all these jokes crossed each other round Biscarrat as the balls cross each other in the fire of a mélée. He recovered himself amid a deluge of interrogations.
"What do you suppose I have seen?" asked he. "I was too hot when I entered the grotto, and I have been struck with the cold; that is all."
"But the dogs, the dogs, have you seen them again—did you see anything of them—do you know anything about them?"
"I suppose they have gone out by another way."