Barabant, seeing the impossibility of swaying the fanatic by reason, kept silent until they parted. In the Rue Maugout, la Mère Corniche cried to him from her tenebrous sentry-box: "One moment, citoyen." The window-hinges spoke and a shadowy head appeared. "There's a tall fellow above in your room." "In the uniform of the National Guard?" "That's it." Barabant, who had left Javogues too recently to derive any pleasure from a visit of Dossonville, was hastening away when again the querulous voice halted him. "Not so fast, citoyen." "Well, what? I'm in a hurry." "You've seen the Citoyen Marat?" "Marat?" "What! you've not presented your letter?" "Oh, my letter!" Barabant cried, and hastily covering his mistake, said: "But that was days ago." "You didn't forget to speak of me?" "Come, now, la Mère Corniche, I'm not an ingrate!" "And what did he say?" "It brought tears to his eyes." "Truly?" "Pardi! The Citoyen Marat has a heart." Barabant, on the staircase, congratulated himself on his escape from a bad position, little realizing the danger of the present one, and excusing the subterfuge on the light pretext of giving pleasure to the old woman. He hurriedly determined to say nothing to Dossonville of his danger, preferring first to question him. Dossonville, the greetings over, announced his purpose with the question: "Well, young pamphleteer, what have you ready?" Barabant replied by tapping his arm. "I see,--at the Tuileries?" "You were there, of course?" "What Frenchman wasn't?" Barabant, noticing the equivocation, pressed him. "With what section, citoyen?" "I was with no section." "Within or without the Tuileries?" Dossonville rose up. "Again! I thought you were convinced at Santerre's." "You do not answer my question," Barabant insisted. "Why do you ask it?" "Because, Citoyen Dossonville, there are those who claim to have seen you among the defenders." "What's that? Who says that?" At once Dossonville was all alertness. Barabant repeated, adding: "If it is so, citoyen, no matter for what reasons you were present, you cannot ignore the danger you run if recognized." As though to confirm the warning, the stairway suddenly gave out the hurried fall of feet, the door opened, and Nicole appeared, breathless and frightened. "Citoyen Dossonville," she cried, "I come to warn you! Javogues is below!" Dossonville threw a glance to the window, his hand going to his pistol. Then correcting himself, he said: "So this is your trap, is it?" "I am not a spy," Barabant disclaimed indignantly. "You have an escape by the roof; the gutter is solid; once opposite--" "Yes, yes," Nicole added; "pass into my room, through the hall, and out!" "You mistake me," Dossonville interrupted. "I have nothing to fear. Go to the landing. They may stop on the way." Barabant obeyed. Dossonville, turning his back, snatched a paper from his redingote, rolled it into a ball, and tossed it into the gutter.