Lafayette, in his uncomfortable cell, was left in complete ignorance of the fate of Bollman and Huger, though given to understand that they had been executed or soon would be, perhaps under his own window. The long, dreary days wore on until more than a year had passed, with little to make one day different from another, though occasionally he was able to communicate with Pusy or Maubourg through the ingenuity of his "secretary," young Felix Pontonnier, a lad of sixteen, who had managed to cling to him with the devotion of a dog through all his misfortunes. Prison air was hard upon this boy and prison officials were harder still, but his spirits were invincible. He whistled like a bird, he made grotesque motions, he talked gibberish, and these antics were not without point. They were a language of his own devising, by means of which he conveyed to the prisoners such scraps of information as came to him from the outside world. His master had need of all Felix's cheer to help him bear up against the anxiety that grew with each bit of news from France, and grew greater still because of the absence of news from those he loved [Pg 236]best. For the first seven months he heard not a word from wife and children, though soon after his capture he learned about the early days of September in Paris, when the barriers had been closed and houses were searched and prisons "purged" of those suspected of sympathy with the aristocracy. Since then he had heard from his wife; but he had also learned of the trial and death of the king; and rumors had come to him of the Terror. Adrienne's steadfastness had been demonstrated to him through all the years of their married life. Where principle was involved he knew she would not falter; and he had little hope that she could have escaped imprisonment or a worse fate. He had heard absolutely nothing from her now for eighteen months. His captivity has been called "a night five years long," and this was its darkest hour.