From Montagnon's shop I could see across to our house, as much as one can see from one side of a street to the other.
There seemed to be a great commotion going on, as though they were looking for someone; I had no longer any doubt when I saw my mother appear behind the panes of the first landing window, open the window, and look out into the street.
It was evident that not only was someone being searched for, but that my mother was looking for this individual, and that this individual was myself.
I could not depute either Montagnon or his wife to go and make inquiries, for, although I came to them most days, they rarely visited our house: the sudden appearance of one or other of them would have seemed curious, and would assuredly have revealed the whole thing. So I kept quiet, under cover, as Robinson Crusoe said he did when he first saw the savages landing on his island.
After a quarter of an hour M. Deviolaine came out again, and I thought his face looked even angrier than when he went in.
I waited till it was dark, at five o'clock, and, night having fallen, I made myself as invisible as possible, and ran to my kind friend Madame Darcourt.
The reader may remember that when anything serious happened, I always had recourse to her; so once more I laid my case before her, confessed everything to her, and begged her to go to my mother's in order to learn how matters stood.
The good and worthy woman was so fond of me that she would humour my least caprice; so she hurried to the house, and I followed her at a distance; then, when she went in, I glued my eye to a corner of the window-pane.
Unluckily my mother turned her back to the window, so I could not see her face; but I saw her movements, which seemed to me dreadfully threatening.