The Black Tulip, Alexandre Dumas [most recommended books .TXT] 📗

And thus opening the door, he began in the dark to talk to the prisoner.

The dog, on his part, went up to the prisoner, and, growling, smelled about his legs just as though to ask him what right he had still to be alive, after having left the prison in the company of the Recorder and the executioner.

But the fair Rosa called him to her side.

“Well, my master,” said Gryphus, holding up his lantern to throw a little light around, “you see in me your new jailer. I am head turnkey, and have all the cells under my care. I am not vicious, but I’m not to be trifled with, as far as discipline goes.”

“My good Master Gryphus, I know you perfectly well,” said the prisoner, approaching within the circle of light cast around by the lantern.

“Halloa! that’s you, Mynheer van Baerle,” said Gryphus. “That’s you; well, I declare, it’s astonishing how people do meet.”

“Oh, yes; and it’s really a great pleasure to me, good Master Gryphus, to see that your arm is doing well, as you are able to hold your lantern with it.”

Gryphus knitted his brow. “Now, that’s just it,” he said, “people always make blunders in politics. His Highness has granted you your life; I’m sure I should never have done so.”

“Don’t say so,” replied Cornelius; “why not?”

“Because you are the very man to conspire again. You learned people have dealings with the devil.”

“Nonsense, Master Gryphus. Are you dissatisfied with the manner in which I have set your arm, or with the price that I asked you?” said Cornelius, laughing.

“On the contrary,” growled the jailer, “you have set it only too well. There is some witchcraft in this. After six weeks, I was able to use it as if nothing had happened, so much so, that the doctor of the Buytenhof, who knows his trade well, wanted to break it again, to set it in the regular way, and promised me that I should have my blessed three months for my money before I should be able to move it.”

“And you did not want that?”

“I said, ‘Nay, as long as I can make the sign of the cross with that arm’ (Gryphus was a Roman Catholic), ‘I laugh at the devil.’”

“But if you laugh at the devil, Master Gryphus, you ought with so much more reason to laugh at learned people.”

“Ah, learned people, learned people! Why, I would rather have to guard ten soldiers than one scholar. The soldiers smoke, guzzle, and get drunk; they are gentle as lambs if you only give them brandy or Moselle, but scholars, and drink, smoke, and fuddle—ah, yes, that’s altogether different. They keep sober, spend nothing, and have their heads always clear to make conspiracies. But I tell you, at the very outset, it won’t be such an easy matter for you to conspire. First of all, you will have no books, no paper, and no conjuring book. It’s books that helped Mynheer Grotius to get off.”

“I assure you, Master Gryphus,” replied Van Baerle, “that if I have entertained the idea of escaping, I most decidedly have it no longer.”

“Well, well,” said Gryphus, “just look sharp: that’s what I shall do also. But, for all that, I say his Highness has made a great mistake.”

“Not to have cut off my head? thank you, Master Gryphus.”

“Just so, look whether the Mynheer de Witt don’t keep very quiet now.”

“That’s very shocking what you say now, Master Gryphus,” cried Van Baerle, turning away his head to conceal his disgust. “You forget that one of those unfortunate gentlemen was my friend, and the other my second father.”

“Yes, but I also remember that the one, as well as the other, was a conspirator. And, moreover, I am speaking from Christian charity.”

“Oh, indeed! explain that a little to me, my good Master Gryphus. I do not quite understand it.”

“Well, then, if you had remained on the block of Master Harbruck——”

“What?”

“You would not suffer any longer; whereas, I will not disguise it from you, I shall lead you a sad life of it.”

“Thank you for the promise, Master Gryphus.”

And whilst the prisoner smiled ironically at the old jailer, Rosa, from the outside, answered by a bright smile, which carried sweet consolation to the heart of Van Baerle.

Gryphus stepped towards the window.

It was still light enough to see, although indistinctly, through the gray haze of the evening, the vast expanse of the horizon.

“What view has one from here?” asked Gryphus.

“Why, a very fine and pleasant one,” said Cornelius, looking at Rosa.

“Yes, yes, too much of a view, too much.”

And at this moment the two pigeons, scared by the sight and especially by the voice of the stranger, left their nest, and disappeared, quite frightened in the evening mist.

“Halloa! what’s this?” cried Gryphus.

“My pigeons,” answered Cornelius.

“Your pigeons,” cried the jailer, “your pigeons! has a prisoner anything of his own?”

“Why, then,” said Cornelius, “the pigeons which a merciful Father in Heaven has lent to me.”

“So, here we have a breach of the rules already,” replied Gryphus. “Pigeons! ah, young man, young man! I’ll tell you one thing, that before to-morrow is over, your pigeons will boil in my pot.”

“First of all you should catch them, Master Gryphus. You won’t allow these pigeons to be mine! Well, I vow they are even less yours than mine.”

“Omittance is no acquittance,” growled the jailer, “and I shall certainly wring their necks before twenty-four hours are over: you may be sure of that.”

Whilst giving utterance to this ill-natured promise, Gryphus put his head out of the window to examine the nest. This gave Van Baerle time to run to the door, and squeeze the hand of Rosa, who whispered to him,—

“At nine o’clock this evening.”

Gryphus, quite taken up with the desire of catching the pigeons next day, as he had promised he would do, saw and heard nothing of this short interlude; and, after having closed the window, he took the arm of his daughter, left the cell, turned the key twice, drew the bolts, and went off to make the same kind promise to the other prisoners.

He had scarcely withdrawn, when Cornelius went to the door to listen to the sound of his footsteps, and, as soon as they had died away, he ran to the window, and completely demolished the nest of the pigeons.