"Sometimes he has a friend with him, eh?"
The man laughed.
"No, monsieur; he comes in here alone. Many's the time I'll standing in
my door when he'll go by with some gallant, and he never chances to see
me or my shop. While if he's alone it's 'Good morning, Jean. Anything in
the casks to-day?' He can no more get by my door than he'll get by
Death's when the time comes."
"No," agreed M. Étienne; "we all stop there, soon or late. Those friends
of M. Bernet, then--there is none you could put a name to?"
"Why, no, monsieur, more's the pity. He has none lives in this quarter.
M. Bernet's in low water, you understand, monsieur. If he lives here, it
is because he can't help it. But he goes elsewhere for his friends."
"Then you can tell us, my man, where he lodges?"
"Aye, that can I," mine host answered, bustling out from behind the bar,
eager in the interest of the pleasant-spoken, open-handed gallant. "Just
round the corner of the Rue Clichet, in the court. The first house on
the left, that is his. I would go with monsieur, only I cannot leave the
shop alone, and the wife not back from market. But monsieur cannot miss
it. The first house in the court. Thank you, monsieur. Au revoir,
monsieur."
In the doorway of the first house on the left in the little court stood
an old man with a wooden leg, sweeping heaps of refuse out of the
passage.
"It appears that every one on this stair lacks something," M. Étienne
murmured to me. "It is the livery of the house. Can you tell me, friend,
where I may find M. Bernet?"
The concierge regarded us without cordiality, while by no means ceasing
his endeavours to cover our shoes with his sweepings.
"Third story back," he said.
"Does M. Bernet lodge alone?"
"One of him's enough," the old fellow growled, whacking out his dirty
broom on the door-post, powdering us with dust. M. Étienne, coughing,
pursued his inquiries:
"Ah, I understood he shared his lodgings with a comrade. He has a
friend, then, in the building?"
"Aye, I suppose so," the old chap grinned, "when monsieur walks in."
"But he has another friend besides me, has he not?" M. Étienne
persisted. "One who, if he does not live here, comes often to see M.
Bernet?"
"You seem to know all about it. Better see Bernet himself, instead of
chattering here all day."
"Good advice, and I'll take it," said M. Étienne, lightly setting foot
on the stair, muttering to himself as he mounted, "and come back to
break your head, mon vieillard."
We went up the three flights and along the passage to the door at the
back, whereon M. Étienne pounded loudly. I could not see his reason, and
heartily I wished he would not. It seemed to me a creepy thing to be
knocking on a man's door when we knew very well he would never open it
again. We knocked as if we fully thought him within, when all the while
we knew he was lying a stone on the stones under M. de Mirabeau's garden
wall. Perhaps by this time he had been found; perhaps one of the
marquis's liveried lackeys, or a passing idler, or a woman with a
market-basket had come upon him; perhaps even now he was being borne
away on a plank to be identified. And here were we, knocking, knocking,
as if we innocently expected him to open to us. I had a chill dread that
suddenly he would open to us. The door would swing wide and show him
pale and bloody, with the broken sword in his heart. At the real
creaking of a hinge I could scarce swallow a cry.
It was not Bernet's door, but the door at the front which opened,
letting a stream of sunlight into the dark passage. In the doorway stood
a woman, with two bare-legged babies clinging to her skirts.
"Madame," M. Étienne addressed her, with the courtesy due to a duchess,
"I have been knocking at M. Bernet's door without result. Perhaps you
could give me some hint as to his whereabouts?"
"Ah, I am sorry. I know nothing to tell monsieur," she cried
regretfully, impressed, as the concierge had not been, by his look and
manner. "But this I can say: he went out last night, and I do not
believe he has been in since. He went out about nine--or it may have
been later than that. Because I did not put the children to bed till
after dark; they enjoy running about in the cool of the evening as much
as anybody else, the little dears. And they were cross last night, the
day was so hot, and I was a long time hushing them to sleep. Yes, it
must have been after ten, because they were asleep, and the man
stumbling on the stairs woke Pierre. And he cried for an hour. Didn't
you, my angel?"
She picked one of the brats up in her arms to display him to us. M.
Étienne asked:
"What man?"
"Why, the one that came for him. The one he went out with."
"And what sort of person was this?"
"Nay, how was I to see? Would I be out walking the common passage with a
child to hush? I was rocking the cradle."
"But who does come here to visit M. Bernet?"
"I've never seen any one, monsieur. I've never laid eyes on M. Bernet
but twice. I keep in my apartment. And besides, we have only been here a
week."
"I thank you, madame," M. Étienne said, turning to the stairs.
She ran out to the rail, babies and all.
"But I could take a message for him, monsieur. I will make a point of
seeing him when he comes in."
"I will not burden you, madame," M. Étienne answered from the story
below. But she was loath to stop talking, and hung over the railing to
call:
"Beware of your footing, monsieur. Those second-floor people are not so
tidy as they might be; one stumbles over all sorts of their rubbish out
in the public way."
The door in front of us opened with a startling suddenness, and a big,
brawny wench bounced out to demand of us:
"What is that she says? What are you saying of us, you slut?"
We had no mind to be mixed in the quarrel. We fled for our lives down
the stair.
The old carl, though his sweeping was done, leaned on his broom on the
outer step.
"So you didn't find M. Bernet at home? I could have told you as much had
you been civil enough to ask."
I would have kicked the old curmudgeon, but M. Étienne drew two gold
pieces from his pouch.
"Perchance if I ask you civilly, you will tell me with whom M. Bernet
went out last night?"
"Who says he went out with anybody?"
"I do," and M. Étienne made a motion to return the coins to their place.
"Since you know so much, it's strange you don't know a little more," the
old chap growled. "Well, Lord knows if it is really his, but he goes by
the name of Peyrot."
"And where does he lodge?"
"How should I know? I have trouble enough keeping track of my own
lodgers, without bothering my head about other people's."
"Now rack your brains, my friend, over this fellow," M. Étienne said
patiently, with a persuasive chink of his pouch. "Recollect now; you
have been sent to this monsieur with a message."
"Well, Rue des Tournelles, sign of the Gilded Shears," the old carl spat
out at last.
"You are sure?"
"Hang me else."
"If you are lying to me, I will come back and beat you to a jelly with
your own broom."
"It's the truth, monsieur," he said, with some proper show of respect at
last. "Peyrot, at the Gilded Shears, Rue des Tournelles. You may beat me
to a jelly if I lie."
"It would do you good in any event," M. Étienne told him, but flinging
him his pistoles, nevertheless. The old fellow swooped upon them,
gathered them up, and was behind the closed door all in one movement.
But as we walked away, he opened a little wicket in the upper panel, and
stuck out his ugly head to yell after us:
"If M. Bernet's not at home yet, neither will his friend be. I've told
you what will profit you none."
"You mistake, Sir Gargoyle," M. Étienne called over his shoulder. "Your
information is entirely to my needs."