The jury retired for a quarter of an hour, and according to the judgment of these twelve countrymen—gentlemen of the jury, as they are styled—Claude Gueux was condemned to death.
At the very onset several of them were much impressed with the name of Gueux (vagabond), and that influenced their decision.
When the verdict was pronounced, Claude simply said—
“Very well; but there are two questions these gentlemen have not answered. Why did this man steal? What made him a murderer?”
He made a good supper that night, exclaiming, “Thirty-six years have now passed me.”
He refused to make any appeal until the last minute, but at the instance of one of the sisters who had nursed him he consented to do so.
She in her fulness of heart gave him a five-franc piece.
His fellow-prisoners, as we have already noticed, were devoted to him, and placed all the means at their disposal to help him to escape: they threw into his dungeon, through the air-hole, a nail, some wire, the handle of a pail—any one of these would have been enough for a man like Claude to free himself from his chains; he gave them up to the warder.
On the 8th of June, 1832, seven months and four days after the murder, the recorder of the court came, and Claude was told he had but one hour more to live, for his appeal had been rejected.
“Indeed,” said Claude, coldly; “I slept well last night, and doubtless I shall pass my next even better.”