Whereupon the stranger flicked a look up and down the street, then put his hand in his inner breast pocket.
"Le Temps," he whispered hoarsely, flashing looks up and down the street.
"How much?" asked Jean.
"Five francs," he answered. "Put it away toute suite, vous savez c'est dangereux."
Then quickly he added, walking along beside us still, and speaking still in that hoarse, melodramatic voice (which pleased him a little, I couldn't help thinking), "Les Allemands will give me a year in prison if they catch me, so I have to make it pay, n'est-ce-pas? But the Brussels people must have their newspapers. They've got to know the truth about the war, n'est-ce-pas? and the English papers tell the truth!"
"How do you get the newspapers," I whispered, like a conspirator myself.
"I sneak in and out of Brussels in a peasant's cart, all the way to Sottegem," he whispered back. "Every week they catch one of us. But still we go on—n'est-ce-pas? We don't know what fear is in Brussels. That's because we've got M. Max at the head of us! Ah, there's a man for you, M. Max!"
A look of pride and tenderness flashed across his dark, crafty face, then he was gone, and I found myself longing for the morning, when I should talk with M. Max myself.
But Sunday I was awakened by the loud booming of cannon, proceeding from the direction of Malines.
"What is happening?" I asked the maid who brought my coffee "Isn't that firing very near?"