“And that's all, M. Buhot,” said I, with a carriage he could not mistake.
He shrugged his shoulders again, wrote something in a book on the desk before him with great deliberation and then asked me how I liked my quarters in Bicêtre.
“Tolerably well,” I said. “I've been in better, but I might be in waur.”
He laughed a little at the Scotticism that seemed to recall something—perhaps a pleasantry of my uncle's—to him, and then said he, “I'm sorry they cannot be yours very much longer, M. Greig. We calculated that a week or two of this priest's company would have been enough to inspire a distaste and secure his confession, but apparently we were mistaken. You shall be taken to other quarters on Saturday.”
“I hope, M. Buhot,” said I, “they are to be no worse than those I occupy now.”
His face reddened a little at this—I felt always there was some vein of special kindness to me in this man's nature—and he said hesitatingly, “Well, the truth is, 'tis Galbanon.”
“Before a trial?” I asked, incredulous.
“The trial will come in good time,” he said, rising to conclude the parley, and he turned his back on me as I was conducted out of the room and back to the cell, where Father Hamilton waited with unwonted agitation for my tidings.
“Well, lad,” he cried, whenever we were alone, “what stirs? I warrant they have not a jot of evidence against thee,” but in a second he saw from my face the news was not so happy, and his own face fell.
“We are to be separated on Saturday,” I told him.