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Now and again one would raise his head, and with a laugh, or a "Sapristi!" or a "Sacre bleu!" drop back into comfort again. After about ten minutes' walk he was brought to a small wooden house, the door was thrown open, he was tossed inside, and the soldiers entered after. The room was empty save for a bench, some shelves, a table, on which a lantern burned, and a rude crucifix on the wall.
He passed over their coats, from right to left, the cordon bleu with the cross of gold suspended from it, placed the collar on the mantle, gave a book of hours and a decastich to each one, who kissed his hand, rose, and returned to his place.
A shattered stool, broken in a frolic, and half a dozen empty wine-skins strewed the floor, and helped to give the place an air of untidiness and disorder. I looked round with eyes of disgust, and my gorge rose. They had spilled oil, and the place reeked foully. 'VENTRE BLEU! I said. 'Is this conduct in a gentleman's house, you rascals?
"D n!" yelled out Jos, wild with fear, rage, and mortification; and Isidor came in at this juncture, swearing in his turn. "Pas de chevaux, sacre bleu!" hissed out the furious domestic. All the horses were gone. Jos was not the only man in Brussels seized with panic that day.
Sacré bleu! those scoundrels of English to menace the uniformed patriots of the French republic! The second in command drew a revolver, and pointing at the hairy breast of the leader of the Noa-Noans, shouted: "Au le vapeur! Diable! What, you whisky-filled pigs, you will resist the law?"
"The tall blonde!" repeated M. Paul. "Exactly. He has been here several times with a woman he calls Anita. That's all I know about it. Anyway, what difference does it make since he didn't come to-night?" "How do you know he didn't come? He had a key to the alleyway door, didn't he?" "Yes, but I tell you he sent a petit bleu." The detective shrugged his shoulders.
Coralie, looking round at the chapter of journalists, ordered in a breakfast from the Cadran bleu, the nearest restaurant, and asked her visitors to adjourn to her handsomely furnished dining-room when Berenice announced that the meal was ready. In the middle of the repast, when the champagne had gone to all heads, the motive of the visit came out.
Coquenil began at once with questions about private room Number Seven. We had reserved this room and what had prevented the person from occupying it? M. Gritz replied that Number Seven had been engaged some days before by an old client, who, at the last moment, had sent a petit bleu to say that he had changed his plans and would not require the room.
This story was contrived on account of the cordon bleu, which the King has not always time to lay aside, because, to do that, he must change his coat, and in order to account for his having a lodging in the castle so near the King.
Cigarette nodded and laughed. "Pretty fair, Tata; but I have heard better. Bah! a grand thing certainly, to fright a peasant, and scamper off with a goose!" "Sacre bleu!" grumbled Tata, who was himself of opinion that his exploit had been worthy of the feats of Harlequin; "thy heart is all gone to the Englishman." Cigarette laughed saucily and heartily, tickled at the joke.
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