The heat is overwhelming, the restraint almost unbearable; and all faces bear the marks of oppressive fatigue; but nobody thinks of leaving the house. A thousand contradictory reports circulate through the excited crowd. Some say that Count Claudieuse has died; others, on the contrary, report him better, and add that he has sent for the priest from Brechy.
At last, a few minutes after nine o’clock, the jury reappears.
Jacques de Boiscoran is declared guilty, and, on the score of extenuating circumstances, sentenced to twenty years’ penal labor.
THIRD PART—COCOLEU
I.
Thus M. Galpin triumphed, and M. Gransiere had reason to be proud of his eloquence. Jacques de Boiscoran had been found guilty.
But he looked calm, and even haughty, as the president, M. Domini, pronounced the terrible sentence, a thousand times braver at that moment than the man who, facing the squad of soldiers from whom he is to receive death, refuses to have his eyes bandaged, and himself gives the word of command with a firm voice.
That very morning, a few moments before the beginning of the trial, he had said to Dionysia,—
“I know what is in store for me; but I am innocent. They shall not see me turn pale, nor hear me ask for mercy.”