Charlot is the name by which the executioner is known to the populace and the prison world in Paris. The nickname dates from the Revolution of 1789.
The words produced a great sensation. The prisoners looked at each other.
“It is all over with him,” the warder went on; “the warrant has been delivered to Monsieur Gault, and the sentence has just been read to him.”
“And so the fair Madeleine has received the last sacraments?” said la Pouraille, and he swallowed a deep mouthful of air.
“Poor little Theodore!” cried le Biffon; “he is a pretty chap too. What a pity to drop your nut” (eternuer dans le son) “so young.”
The warder went towards the gate, thinking that Jacques Collin was at his heels. But the Spaniard walked very slowly, and when he was getting near to Julien he tottered and signed to la Pouraille to give him his arm.
“He is a murderer,” said Napolitas to the priest, pointing to la Pouraille, and offering his own arm.
“No, to me he is an unhappy wretch!” replied Jacques Collin, with the presence of mind and the unction of the Archbishop of Cambrai. And he drew away from Napolitas, of whom he had been very suspicious from the first. Then he said to his pals in an undertone:
“He is on the bottom step of the Abbaye de Monte-a-Regret, but I am the Prior! I will show you how well I know how to come round the beaks. I mean to snatch this boy’s nut from their jaws.”
“For the sake of his breeches!” said Fil-de-Soie with a smile.