"The devil take the unlucky dog who must needs be broken on the wheel
just when we want to cross the Place de Greve. Why couldn't he have put
it off until to-morrow morning, I should like to know!"
"You may be sure that the poor wretch would be only too glad to do so if
he could," answered the other, "for the occasion is a far more serious
matter to him than to us."
"The best thing we can do under the circumstances, my dear de Sigognac,
is to turn our heads away if the spectacle is too revolting--though it
is by no means easy, when something horrible is taking place close at
hand. Even Saint Augustine opened his eyes in the arena at a loud cheer
from the people, though he had vowed to himself beforehand to keep them
closed."
"At all events, we shall not be detained here long," rejoined de
Sigognac, "for there comes the prisoner. See, Vallombreuse, how the
crowd gives way before him, though it will not let us move an inch."
A rickety cart, drawn by a miserable old skeleton of a horse, and
surrounded by mounted guards, was slowly advancing through the dense
throng towards the scaffold. In it were a venerable priest, with a long
white beard, who was holding a crucifix to the lips of the condemned
man, seated beside him, the executioner, placed behind his victim, and
holding the end of the rope that bound him, and an assistant, who was
driving the poor old horse.
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