Some hours later when everyone seemed to be asleep in the inn, the Burglar broke open the door of the yard with a cleverness and quickness which impressed even his confederates, and accompanied by them effected an entrance into the inn. They crept forward with the greatest caution.
Suddenly they were stopped short by a loud burst of laughter which startled the silence of the night. Oh, they recognized that laugh! And, as the phrase goes, they took themselves off. They beat a retreat with a haste that caused them to knock their heads against the door which a few minutes before they had opened and which was now closed. At that moment a fusillade burst around them.
They performed wonders in their effort to get away from the infernal inn in which they expected to take their victims by surprise, but were so nicely cornered. By extraordinary agility they managed to climb to the top of a wall and drop to the other side at the risk of breaking their necks. Nevertheless, they lost a few of their feathers; and the next morning the extent of their downfall was apparent in the traces which they left behind—traces of blood.
"All the same," said Chéri-Bibi in confidence to Fernandez, "you'll now understand how necessary it is for me to stay in the country until they are collared with me—just to keep my eye on them, at close quarters, so that they don't do any harm to my friend the Nut. . . ."
[CHAPTER IX]
CHÉRI-BIBI AND THE NUT SAY GOOD-BYE
When the steamer was in the roadstead and the time came for Chéri-Bibi and the Nut to say good-bye, no words were wasted by them. It was a moment of great simplicity, for though out of the fullness of the heart the mouth speaketh—pectus est quod disertes facit—yet the heart may be too full for words.
Chéri-Bibi, as may be imagined, after so many vicissitudes presented a very disordered appearance which was not, however, altogether unsuited to him. Hardly anything remained of his old clothes but his leather trousers and a worn-out scrap of coarse canvas with which he managed to conceal certain peculiar tattoo-marks which were not the work of any native of Guiana.
Thus, as may be imagined, his appearance was the antithesis of the Nut's, who had just put on a new suit of clothes of the latest Parisian fashion which had come from Rio a few weeks earlier.
When the Nut entered the room in which Chéri-Bibi was waiting for him in intense silence, the latter at first failed to recognize him. A man of fashion stood before him. Nevertheless, Chéri-Bibi had known men of fashion before, not only because he used to keep their company and help them on their passage from life to death, but because for a certain time he was a man of fashion himself. But the Nut took his breath away.