"What are these?" queried Carrier.
"A few papers," replied Chauvelin, "which one of your Marats, Paul Friche by name, picked up in the wake of the Englishmen. I caught sight of them in the far distance, and sent the Marats after them. For awhile Paul Friche kept on their track, but after that they disappeared in the darkness."
"Who were the senseless louts," growled Carrier, "who allowed a pack of foreign assassins to escape? I'll soon make them disappear ... in the Loire."
"You will do what you like about that, citizen Carrier," retorted Chauvelin drily; "in the meanwhile you would do well to examine these papers."
He sorted these out, examined them one by one, then passed them across to Carrier. Lalouët, impudent and inquisitive, sat on the corner of the desk, dangling his legs. With scant ceremony he snatched one paper after another out of Carrier's hands and examined them curiously.
"Can you understand all this gibberish?" he asked airily. "Jean Baptiste, my friend, how much English do you know?"
"Not much," replied the proconsul, "but enough to recognise that abominable doggrel rhyme which has gone the round of the Committees of Public Safety throughout the country."
"I know it by heart," rejoined young Lalouët. "I was in Paris once, when citizen Robespierre received a copy of it. Name of a dog!" added the youngster with a coarse laugh, "how he cursed!"
It is doubtful however if citizen Robespierre did on that occasion curse quite so volubly as Carrier did now.
"If I only knew why that satané Englishman throws so much calligraphy about," he said, "I would be easier in my mind. Now this senseless rhyme ... I don't see...."