CHAPTER XXIX.
RELEASE.—NARCISSE.
As some children were playing in the street before the Parish Prison next morning, they suddenly started and scampered toward the prison’s black entrance. A physician’s carriage had driven briskly up to it, ground its wheels against the curb-stone, and halted. If any fresh crumbs of horror were about to be dropped, the children must be there to feast on them. Dr. Sevier stepped out, gave Mary his hand and then his arm, and went in with her. A question or two in the prison office, a reference to the rolls, and a turnkey led the way through a dark gallery lighted with dimly burning gas. The stench was suffocating. They stopped at the inner gate.
“Why didn’t you bring him to us?” asked the Doctor, scowling resentfully at the facetious drawings and legends on the walls, where the dampness glistened in the sickly light.
The keeper made a low reply as he shot the bolts.
“What?” quickly asked Mary.
“He’s not well,” said Dr. Sevier.
The gate swung open. They stepped into the yard and across it. The prisoners paused in a game of ball. Others, who were playing cards, merely glanced up and went on. The jailer pointed with his bunch of keys to a cell before him. Mary glided away from the Doctor and darted in. There was a cry and a wail.
The Doctor followed quickly. Ristofalo passed out as he entered. Richling lay on a rough gray blanket spread on the pavement with the Italian’s jacket under his head. Mary had thrown herself down beside him upon her knees, and their arms were around each other’s neck.