But
she made a great effort and remained still. The Chouan flung the
sticks into the fireplace, after trying the strength of an old crane
which was fastened to a long iron bar; then he set fire to the wood
with his torch. Marie saw with terror that the man was the same
Pille-Miche to whom her rival had delivered her, and whose figure,
illuminated by the flame, was like that of the little boxwood men so
grotesquely carved in Germany. The moans of his prisoner produced a
broad grin upon features that were ribbed with wrinkles and tanned by
the sun.
"You see," he said to his victim, "that we Christians keep our
promises, which you don't. That fire is going to thaw out your legs
and tongue and hands. Hey! hey! I don't see a dripping-pan to put
under your feet; they are so fat the grease may put out the fire. Your
house must be badly furnished if it can't give its master all he wants
to warm him."
The victim uttered a sharp cry, as if he hoped someone would hear him
through the ceiling and come to his assistance.
"Ho! sing away, Monsieur d'Orgemont; they are all asleep upstairs, and
Marche-a-Terre is just behind me; he'll shut the cellar door."
While speaking Pille-Miche was sounding with the butt-end of his
musket the mantel-piece of the chimney, the tiles of the floor, the
walls and the ovens, to discover, if possible, where the miser hid his
gold.
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