"You may speak before him--he is one of us.But why are you alone?"
"I come alone, but in the name of my comrades."
"Oh!" said Morok, with a sigh of satisfaction, "they consent."
"They refuse--just as I do!"
"What, the devil! they refuse? Have they no more courage than women?"
cried Morok, grinding his teeth with rage.
"Hark ye," answered Olivier, coolly."We have received your letters, and seen your agent.We have had proof that he is really connected with great societies, many members of which are known to us."
"Well! why do you hesitate?"
"First of all, nothing proves that these societies are ready to make a movement."
"I tell you they are."
"He--tells you--they are," said Sleepinbuff, stammering "and I (hic!)
affirm it.Forward! March!"
"That's not enough," replied Olivier."Besides, we have reflected upon it.For a week the factory was divided.Even yesterday the discussion was too warm to be pleasant.But this morning Father Simon called to him; we explained ourselves fully before him, and he brought us all to one mind.We mean to wait, and if any disturbance breaks out, we shall see."
"Is that your final word?"
"It is our last word."
"Silence!" cried Sleepinbuff, suddenly, as he listened, balancing himself on his tottering legs."It is like the noise of a crowd not far off." A
dull sound was indeed audible, which became every moment more and more distinct, and at length grew formidable.
"What is that?" said Olivier, in surprise.
"Now," replied Morok, smiling with a sinister air, "I remember the host told me there was a great ferment in the village against the factory.If you and your other comrades had separated from Hardy's other workmen, as I hoped, these people who are beginning to howl would have been for you, instead of against you."
"This was a trap, then, to set one half of M.Hardy's workmen against the other!" cried Olivier; "you hoped that we should make common cause with these people against the factory, and that--"
The young man had not time to finish.A terrible outburst of shouts, howls, and hisses shook the tavern.At the same instant the door was abruptly opened, and the host, pale and trembling, hurried into the chamber, exclaiming: "Gentlemen! do any of you work at M.Hardy's factory?"
"I do," said Olivier.
"Then you are lost.Here are the Wolves in a body, saying there are Devourers here from M.Hardy's, and offering them battle--unless the Devourers will give up the factory, and range themselves on their side."
"It was a trap, there can be no doubt of it!" cried Olivier, looking at Morok and Sleepinbuff, with a threatening air; "if my mates had come, we were all to be let in."
"I lay a trap, Olivier?" stammered Jacques Rennepont."Never!"
"Battle to the Devourers! or let them join the Wolves!" cried the angry crowd with one voice, as they appeared to invade the house.
"Come!" exclaimed the host.Without giving Olivier time to answer, he seized him by the arm, and opening a window which led to a roof at no very great height from the ground, he said to him: "Make your escape by this window, let yourself slide down, and gain the fields; it is time."
As the young workman hesitated, the host added, with a look of terror:
"Alone, against a couple of hundred, what can you do? A minute more, and you are lost.Do you not hear them? They have entered the yard; they are coming up."
Indeed, at this moment, the groans, the hisses, and cheers redoubled in violence; the wooden staircase which led to the first story shook beneath the quick steps of many persons, and the shout arose, loud and piercing:
"Battle to the Devourers!"
"Fly, Olivier!" cried Sleepinbuff, almost sobered by the danger.
Hardly had he pronounced the words when the door of the large room, which communicated with the small one in which they were, was burst open with a frightful crash.
"Here they are!" cried the host, clasping his hands in alarm.Then, running to Olivier, he pushed him, as it were, out of the window; for, with one foot on the sill, the workman still hesitated.
The window once closed, the publican returned towards Morok the instant the latter entered the large room, into which the leaders of the Wolves had just forced an entry, whilst their companions were vociferating in the yard and on the staircase.Eight or ten of these madmen, urged by others to take part in these scenes of disorder, had rushed first into the room, with countenances inflamed by wine and anger; most of them were armed with long sticks.A blaster, of Herculean strength and stature, with an old red handkerchief about his head, its ragged ends streaming over his shoulders, miserably dressed in a half-worn goat-skin, brandished an iron drilling-rod, and appeared to direct the movements.
With bloodshot eyes, threatening and ferocious countenance, he advanced towards the small room, as if to drive back Morok, and exclaimed, in a voice of thunder:
"Where are the Devourers?--the Wolves will eat 'em up!"
The host hastened to open the door of the small room, saying: "There is no one here, my friends--no one.Look for yourselves."
"It is true," said the quarryman, surprised, after peeping into the room;
"where are they, then? We were told there were a dozen of them here.
They should have marched with us against the factory, or there'd 'a been a battle, and the Wolves would have tried their teeth!"
"If they have not come," said another, "they will come.Let's wait."
"Yes, yes; we will wait for them."
"We will look close at each other."