The man told over the coins, muttering that the large piece was _bien forte et trébuchante_, then made an accurate note of them and gave the list to Bertie. "All," he said again, "will be returned you on your exit, unless you choose to give them to Bluet and me. We get little enough, though God knows we have also little enough--at least, I have--of opportunities for spending. Yet even here one may have his little pleasures," and he winked at Bertie, who turned from him in disgust. "No trinkets on the bosom," he went on questioningly, "no lockets, nor crosses, nor reliquaries of saints? Humph!" "There is," replied Elphinston, "on my breast a bag of satin, in which is a lock of hair--the hair of the woman whom I love. Fellow, do you think I will let you take that, or even fasten your foul eyes on it! Ask me no more; otherwise I will speak to the Governor." "It is against the rules," said the other, "quite against the rules, yet----" "Curse the rules!" "Yet," he said, "so that when you leave us you will give me one, only one of those pieces, I will not insist." "Leave me," said Bertie, and his voice was so stern that, followed by the turnkey, the man slunk out of the room, and a moment afterwards the heavy door was locked and barred on him. CHAPTER XXII. DESPAIR! Left alone at last, he walked up and down the huge chamber, or vault, his mind full of melancholy, heartbroken reflections. "My God, my God!" he muttered, "what have I done that thus Thou lettest Thy hand fall so heavily on me? What fresh sin committed, that this fresh punishment should be mine! I have lost the one thing I cared for in this life, lost her; now I am incarcerated here in this place of horror, this place where men's existences, even their very names, are forgotten as much as though they had lain for years in their graves; this place which may be my grave." Then, a few moments later, his heart and courage returned to him, and he murmured to himself again: "Yet, I will not repine. That abject creature spoke of others who had been here and yet escaped, obtained their liberty, all but him, the hapless Masque de Fer, who drew his last breath in this gloomy dungeon. Bassompiere, Luxembourg, De Biron, all went forth to the world again. How many men have I not known myself who have been here? There was one, the old Comte de Tilly, who told me he had been incarcerated thirteen times, and that, whenever he saw the exempts in the street, he took off his hat to them, and asked if by any chance they happened to be seeking for him. And these walls," he exclaimed, looking up at the blackened sides of the room, "seem to bear testimony to many who have inhabited the place."