"I would not remain. I would make such use of my feet and hands that I would escape," said Skeleton.
"But if you could not—if you were sure that you could not escape?"
"Then I would kill the first one I could, in order to be guillotined."
"But if, instead of condemning the red-handed to death, they condemned them to a solitary cell for life?"
Skeleton seemed to be staggered by this reflection. After amoment's pause he replied:
"Then I do not know what I should do. I would break my head against the walls. I would allow myself to die with hunger rather than be in a cell. How? All alone—all my life alone with myself? without the hope of escape? I tell you it is not possible. You know there is no one bolder than I am. I would bleed a man for a crown, and even for nothing, for honor. They think that I have only assassinated two persons; but if the dead could speak, there are five who could tell how I work." The brigand boasted of his crimes. These sanguinary egotisms are among the most characteristic traits of hardened criminals. A prison governor told us,"If the pretended murders of which these wretches boast were real, population would be decimated."
"So I say," replied Barbillon, boasting in his turn; "they think that I only laid out the milkwoman's husband in the city; but I have served many others out, with Big Robert, who was shortened last year."
"It was only to tell you," said Skeleton, "that I neither fear fire nor the devil. But, if I were in a cell, and very sure of not being able to escape—thunder! I believe I should be afraid."
"Of what?" asked Nicholas.
"Of being all alone," answered the cock of the walk.