Carinne, clinging to me, cried, “No, no!” in a weeping voice.
“Eh bien!” said the creature, indifferently; “you can take or leave, as you will.”
“We will take, citizen.”
“Look, then!” (he gripped my arm and haled me to the mound) “and note what I do.”
There was a point—roughly undistinguishable from the rest—where a welded mass of calcareous bone and rubbish lay upon the litter. This was, in effect, a door in one piece, with an infant’s skull for handle and concealed hinges of gut to one side to prevent its slipping out of place. Removed, it revealed a black mouth opening into an inner vacancy.
“Underneath lies a great box or kennel of wood,” said Gusman, “with a manhole cut in its side; and round and over the box the stuff is piled. At the very word of warning, creep in and close the entrance. It is like enough ye will need it.”
“And here we are to stay?”
“That is according to your inclination.”
“But Mor’ Dieu, my friend! if thou wert to forget or overlook us entombed in this oubliette?”
“Soyez content. I might forget thou wert lacking food, but never that the citizen President gave thee a purse.”