In the rue Douane he spoke again:
"Ah! Frowenfeld"--and smiled unpleasantly, with his head down.
And as he made yet another turn, and took his meditative way down the city's front, along the blacksmith's shops in the street afterward called Old Levee, he resumed, in English, and with a distinctness that made a staggering sailor halt and look after him:
"There are but two steps to civilization, the first easy, the second difficult; to construct--to reconstruct--ah! there it is! the tearing down! The tear'--"
He was still, but repeated the thought by a gesture of distress turned into a slow stroke of the forehead.
"Monsieur Honoré Grandissime," said a voice just ahead.
"Eh, bien?"
At the mouth of an alley, in the dim light of the streep lamp, stood the dark figure of Honoré Grandissime, f.m.c., holding up the loosely hanging form of a small man, the whole front of whose clothing was saturated with blood.
"Why, Charlie Keene! Let him down again, quickly--quickly; do not hold him so!"
"Hands off," came in a ghastly whisper from the shape.