“Is it safe?” he asked. “There are men there who may see you take the coat. Will they betray you, if they see you?”
“Never,” the man answered. “They are my brothers, set there to watch for the corporal.”
“Take then the coat and cap.”
The soldier cast a glance about him, to see if it were safe to take them; then he slipped them through the bars and under his coat. “Wait yet, one moment,” he said; “should you desire food or drink, I would buy some, if you would give the penny. I mention this, because otherwise you will have neither food nor drink.”
“Thank you, I need neither food nor drink,” Sard said, “but only the engineer, as soon as you can bring him.”
“Right, Excellency,” the man said. “And now it will be necessary that I close the shutter.”
“Right,” Sard said. “And thank you.”
The man closed the shutter. “I will start straight away,” he said.
Sard heard him move away to the other soldiers who were standing in the shade of the wall.
“I have the coat,” he said proudly to his comrades. “And not only that, he said, ‘You had better take the cap as well.’ I had asked for the coat as a disguise, thinking it the limit that I could ask, when, lo, he himself says, ‘You had better take the cap as well.’ ”