"You mean?" The mountebank looked first at the closed blinds; then at the door, and a sudden determination came to his eyes.
"Those especially prepared for the followers of the Black Seigneur, taken prisoners near Casque, for example!"
"They are dungeons?"
"With Jacques for keeper! The little sexton, we call him, because the prisoners go generally from the cells to the pit, and the quicklime is the hunchback's graveyard!"
"This Jacques—" A growing impatience shone ominously from the prisoner's glance; his attention, that of a man straining to catch some expected sound without, focused itself on the speaker. "This Jacques—what sort of quarters has he?"
"Oh, he lives anywhere; everywhere! Sometimes at the thieves' inn; again in one of the storehouses near the wheel. They say, though, he is not a great hand to sleep, but passes most of his time like a cat, prowling in and out the black passages and tunnels of the Mount. But," abruptly breaking off, "the play—that's what I want to know about! The end! How did it end?"
"I'm in no mood for talking."
"Take the bottle, an' it'll loosen your tongue!"
"No."
"What! you refuse?"