"But who will lead me?" inquired the Schoolmaster, in a hoarse voice, and securing his light and flexible burden in his herculean arms.
"Old wise head!—he thinks of every thing!" said the Chouette.
Then, lifting aside her shawl, she unfastened a red pocket-handkerchief which covered her skinny neck, and, twisting it into its length, said to the Schoolmaster:
"Open your ivories, and take the end of this 'wipe' between them. Hold tight! Tortillard will take the other end in his hand, and you have nothing to do but to follow him. The good blind man requires a good dog! Here, brat!"
The cripple cut a caper, and made a sort of low and odd barking. Then, taking the other end of the handkerchief in his hand, he led the Schoolmaster in this way, whilst the Chouette hastened forward to apprise Barbillon. We have not attempted to paint Fleur-de-Marie's terror when she found herself in the power of the Chouette and the Schoolmaster. She felt all her strength leave her, and could not offer the slightest resistance.
Some minutes afterwards the Goualeuse was lifted into the fiacre which Barbillon drove, and although it was night they closed the window-blinds carefully; and the three accomplices went, with their almost expiring victim, towards the plain of St. Denis, where Thomas Seyton awaited them.