“He is in his house,” answered Doublon; “if he left it, I should know. I have one witness posted in the Place du Murier, another at the corner of the Law Courts, and another thirty paces from the house. If our man came out, they would whistle; he could not make three paces from his door but I should know of it at once from the signal.”
(Bailiffs speak of their understrappers by the polite title of “witnesses.”)
Here was better hap than Kolb had expected! He went noiselessly out of the office, and spoke to the maid in the kitchen.
“Meestair Touplon ees encaged for som time to kom,” he said; “I vill kom back early to-morrow morning.”
A sudden idea had struck the Alsacien, and he proceeded to put it into execution. Kolb had served in a cavalry regiment; he hurried off to see a livery stable-keeper, an acquaintance of his, picked out a horse, had it saddled, and rushed back to the Place du Murier. He found Madame Eve in the lowest depths of despondency.
“What is it, Kolb?” asked David, when the Alsacien’s face looked in upon them, scared but radiant.
“You have scountrels all arount you. De safest way ees to hide de master. Haf montame thought of hiding the master anywheres?”
When Kolb, honest fellow, had explained the whole history of Cérizet’s treachery, of the circle traced about the house, and of the fat Cointet’s interest in the affair, and given the family some inkling of the schemes set on foot by the Cointets against the master,—then David’s real position gradually became fatally clear.
“It is the Cointet’s doing!” cried poor Eve, aghast at the news; “they are proceeding against you! that accounts for Métivier’s hardness. . . . They are paper-makers—David! they want your secret!”
“But what can we do to escape them?” exclaimed Mme. Chardon.