The two similar raps from the other side showed that she was both heard and understood.
"He has found it. Ah! here he is!"
And with her last exclamation Jean appeared, candle in hand, peering into the room and at Mlle. Fouchette in the dazed way more characteristic of the somnambulist than of one awake and in the full possession of his senses.
"Mon Dieu! mon enfant, what have we here?" he ejaculated as soon as he recovered breath. "What is it? Are you all right? How foolish you are, little one!"
"All right, mon ami."
And she briefly and rapidly recited her adventures, at the end triumphantly exhibiting the bit of iron pipe with which she had opened communication.
His face suddenly froze with horror!
"Give it to me!"
He snatched it from her hand excitedly and held it an instant apart from his candle.
"A thousand thunders!" he gasped, at the same time handling the thing gingerly and looking for a place to lay it down.