"Yes," Feuilly answered.
"How many?"
"Two axes and a crowbar."
"Very good. In all, twenty-six fighting men left. How many guns are there?"
"Thirty-four."
"Eight too many. Keep those guns loaded like the others, and within reach. Place your sabres and pistols in your belts. Twenty men to the barricade. Six will ambush themselves in the garret and at the first-floor window, to fire on the assailants through the loop-holes in the paving-stones. There must not be an idle workman here. Presently, when the drummer sounds the charge, the twenty men below will rush to the barricade, and the first to arrive will be the best placed."
These arrangements made, he turned to Javert, and said to him,—
"I have not forgotten you."
And laying a pistol on the table he added,—
"The last man to leave here will blow out this spy's brains."