"What for?"
"I will read you the warrant," said the tall gendarme. "Come under the light of the lantern yonder."
Gaillard accompanied the two police officers to the other side of the street.
One of them took a large paper from his breast-pocket:—
"Warrant of arrest for the Citizen Gaillard, actor of the theatre of the Republic. Cause: Friend of the Suspect Tournay, and, therefore, to be apprehended."
Gaillard repressed the start that the sight of his friend's name gave him. "'The Suspect Tournay.' My colonel has been arrested," he said to himself. Then heaving a deep sigh he exclaimed aloud in a pathetic tone of voice:—
"It is very sad to think I should be arrested just as I was going to have such a good part in the new piece at the theatre."
"Was it a funny one?" inquired the short gendarme.
"Funny! why if you should hear it, you'd laugh those big brass buttons off your coat."
"It's a shame you can't play it," was the sympathetic rejoinder.