"Do you think you are strong enough to bear this trial, mademoiselle?... You are determined to see your brother?"
Elizabeth bent her head; the magistrate turned towards the warder:
"Open," said he. As the key was turned in the lock he said: "According to instructions from the Head, we have placed him on his bed again.... There is nothing to frighten you ... he seems to be asleep.... Now then!"
But as he opened the door, stretching his arm in the direction of the bed where the body of Jacques Dollon should be, an oath escaped him:
"Great Heavens! The dead man is gone!"
In this cell with its bare walls, its sole furniture an iron bedstead and a stool riveted to the floor, in this little cell which the eye could glance round in a second, there was no vestige of a corpse: Jacques Dollon's body was not there!
"You have mistaken the cell," said the magistrate sharply.
"No, no!" cried the astounded warder.
"You can see, can't you, that Jacques Dollon is not there?"
"He was there a few minutes ago!"