“They are going to hang a gypsy to-day.”
With the abrupt leap of that spider which we have seen fling itself upon a fly at the trembling of its web, she rushed to her air-hole, which opened as the reader knows, on the Place de Grève. A ladder had, in fact, been raised up against the permanent gibbet, and the hangman’s assistant was busying himself with adjusting the chains which had been rusted by the rain. There were some people standing about.
The laughing group of children was already far away. The sacked nun sought with her eyes some passer-by whom she might question. All at once, beside her cell, she perceived a priest making a pretext of reading the public breviary, but who was much less occupied with the “lectern of latticed iron,” than with the gallows, toward which he cast a fierce and gloomy glance from time to time. She recognized monsieur the archdeacon of Josas, a holy man.
“Father,” she inquired, “whom are they about to hang yonder?”
The priest looked at her and made no reply; she repeated her question. Then he said,—
“I know not.”
“Some children said that it was a gypsy,” went on the recluse.
“I believe so,” said the priest.
Then Paquette la Chantefleurie burst into hyena-like laughter.
“Sister,” said the archdeacon, “do you then hate the gypsies heartily?”