“Oh, we all entertain hope to the last,” he said, and retreated into his corner.
Drexel took breath and hope into himself. If he kept silent, if he kept in the shadow, he might go unrecognized by Freeman and there might yet be a chance. He guessed Freeman’s reason for being here, but he saw the governor was not a confidant of the plan.
Colonel Kavelin turned to the gray-garbed brother and sister. “You two are the ones I want.”
“Our execution was set for four,” said Borodin. “Is not our life short enough, without your stealing an hour from it?”
“I suppose,” said Sonya, “that the gallows grows impatient.”
Many a jailer, less hardened than Colonel Kavelin, finds a perverted gratification in delaying to give relieving news to a prisoner—there is a rarely exquisite pleasure in watching the poor thing writhe a little longer. Colonel Kavelin did not deign to set the brother and sister right, and Drexel did not dare to, for the statement that they were to be removed, not executed, would be certain to rouse Freeman’s deadly suspicion.
“Let’s have those irons,” said the governor to the guard. Then he looked back at Drexel who had shrunk into the shadow near the door. “These prisoners are inclined to make trouble, Captain Laroque. To save time and a row, we’ll just put the irons on them ourselves. I’ll attend to the man. Women seem your specialty, so I turn her over to you.”
Drexel could but obey. He pushed his cap far down, and praying that the dusk of the dungeon might be a mask to him against the eyes of Freeman, he took a set of the irons and moved forward to Sonya. She met him with a gaze of magnificent wrath and contempt.
“Is it not enough that you should hang us,” she demanded, “without hanging us in chains?”
“We’ll hang you as we please, my lady,” Drexel roughly responded.