"Oh, thank you, sir," said the head master to Billet, trying to shake hands with him through the bars.
"And above all take good care of Gilbert," said the latter.
"Keep me in? I tell you they shall not," cried the boy, livid with anger as he struggled in the grasp of the school servants.
"Let me go in, and I undertake to quiet him."
The crowd divided and let the farmer and Pitou go into the schoolyard. Already three or four French Guards and a dozen other soldiers instinctively stood sentry at the gates and prevented the young insurgents from bolting out.
Billet went straight up to Sebastian and taking his fine white hands in his large, horny ones, said:
"Sebastian, do you not know Farmer Billet, who farms your father's own land?"
"Yes, sir, I know you now."
"And this lad with me?"
"It must be Ange Pitou."