"Yes, it is the last passage: the beech-nuts are buried under the snow, and the seeds also. Well, then, look! there are more men over there than birds in this pass. All the same, Jean-Claude, we will get over them, so long as every one bears a hand in it! Hexe-Baizel, light the lantern: I am going to show Hullin our supplies of powder and lead."
Hexe-Baizel made a face at this proposition. "For twenty years," said she, "no one has gone into the cave. He can surely believe our word. We believe, for our part, that he will pay us. I will not light the lantern—no, indeed!"
Marc, without saying anything, put out his hand and caught up a cudgel from the pile of wood; thereupon the old woman darted into the nearest hole like a weasel, and, two seconds later, came out with a big horn lantern, which Divès quietly lit at the fire on the hearth.
"Baizel," said he, replacing the stick in its corner, "thou must know that Jean-Claude is an old friend of my childhood, and that I confide much more in him than in thee, old wench; for wert thou not afraid of being hanged the same day as myself, I should long ago have been swinging to a rope's end. Come, Hullin, follow me."
They went out, and the smuggler, turning to the left, walked straight toward the chasm, which projected over the Valtin two hundred feet in the air. He pushed aside the branches of a little oak, which had its roots down below, put forth his leg, and disappeared as though pitched into the abyss. Jean-Claude shuddered, but directly after he saw, against the side of the rock, the head of Divès, who called to him,—"Hullin, put out thy hand to the left—there is a hole. Stretch thy leg out boldly—thou wilt feel a step, and then turn around."
Master Jean-Claude obeyed, with some trepidation. He could feel the hole in the rock, he found the step, and turning slightly, was face to face with his comrade in a sort of arched niche, evidently abutting on a sally-port in times past. At the end of the niche there was a low vault.
"How the devil didst thou discover that?" exclaimed Hullin, much astonished.
"In seeking after nests thirty-five years ago. I was one day on the rock, and I had often observed flying from there a horned-owl and its mate, two splendid birds: their heads were the size of my fists, and the wings six feet broad. I could hear their young calling, and I said to myself, 'They are near the cavern, at the end of the terrace. If I could get round a little beyond the chasm I should have them! By dint of looking and bending over, I perceived at last a corner of the step above the precipice. There was a strong holly-bush at one side. I caught hold of it, put out my leg, and, faith, I found myself here. What a fight, Hullin! The old birds wanted to tear out my eyes. Luckily, it was broad daylight. They went at me like cocks, opened their beaks and hissed, but the sun dazzled them. I kicked them. Finally, they fell on to the top of an old pine-tree down there, and all the jays in the country, the thrushes, chaffinches and tom-tits, flew about them till nightfall, plucking out their feathers. Thou canst not imagine, Jean-Claude, the quantity of bones, rat-skins, leverets, and carrion of all sorts that they had heaped up in this niche. It was pestilential. I threw it all into the Jägerthal, and I discovered this passage. But I must also tell thee that there were two young ones. I twisted their necks and poked them into my bag. Afterward, I quietly entered, and thou shalt see what I found. Come!"
They slipped under the narrow archway, formed of enormous red stones, where the light threw only a flickering glimmer.
Thirty paces farther on, a vast circular cave, low in the middle, and formed in the rock itself, appeared to Hullin. About fifty little casks were arranged at the bottom in shape of pyramids, and, at the sides, a large number of ingots of lead and bales of tobacco, which filled the air with its smell. Marc deposited his lantern at the entrance of the vault, and regarded his hiding-place with gratification and a smile upon his lips.