"Go! your account is finished," muttered the mother, shaking her fist at her son, who had just gone upstairs, "you have brought it upon yourself." Then, assisted by Calabash, who went to look for a bunch of false keys, the widow picked the lock of the cellar where Nicholas was confined, and set him at liberty. CHAPTER XXIV. FRANCOIS AND AMANDINE. Francois and Amandine slept in a room situated immediately over the kitchen, at the extremity of a corridor, into which opened several other rooms, serving as private dining-rooms to the frequenters of the tavern. After having partaken of their frugal supper, instead of extinguishing their lantern, according to the orders of the widow, the two children had watched, leaving their door open, to see Martial when he should come to his room. Placed on a rickety stool, the lantern shed a sickly light through the miserable room. Walls of plaster, a cot for Francois, a child's bedstead, very old, and much too short for Amandine, a heap of broken chairs and benches, the result of some of the drunken brawls and turbulent conduct which had taken place at the tavern; such was the interior of this den. Amandine, seated on the edge of the cot, tried to dress her head with the stolen gift of her brother Nicholas, Francois, kneeling, presented a fragment of looking-glass to his sister, who, with her head half-turned round, was occupied in tying the ends of the silk into a large rosette. Very attentive, and very much struck with this coiffure, Francois neglected for a moment to hold the glass in such a position that his sister could see. "Raise the glass higher now--I cannot see; there--so--good. Wait a little; now I have finished. Look! how do you think it looks?" "Oh, very well--very well! What a fine tie! You'll make one just like it with my cravat, won't you?" "Yes, directly; but let me walk a little. You go before--backward; hold the glass up so that I can see myself as I walk." Francois executed this difficult maneuver very well, to the great satisfaction of Amandine, who strutted up and down triumphantly, under the rosette and ears of her _foulard._ Very innocent under any other circumstances, this conduct become culpable, as Francois and Amandine both knew the prize was stolen; another proof of the frightful facility with which children, even well endowed, are corrupted almost without knowing it, when they are continually plunged in a criminal atmosphere.