‘How—where was it found—in whose keeping has it been, boy?’
‘In mine only; I took it from the ground the same moment that you dropped it, and then came here to place it in M. Boivin’s hands.’
‘Who has taken care of it since that time?’ continued Robespierre, with a slow and sneering accentuation on every word.
‘The pocket-book has never left my possession since it quitted yours,’ was my reply.
‘Just so,’ broke in Boivin, now slowly recovering from his terror. ‘Of its contents I know nothing; nor have I sought to know anything.’
Robespierre looked at me as if to corroborate this statement, and I nodded my head in acquiescence.
‘Who is your father, boy?’
‘I have none—he was guillotined.’
‘His name?’
‘Tiernay.’