is difficult to convey an idea of what Quasimodo had felt. It was the first enjoyment of self-love that he had ever experienced. To that day, he had known only humiliation, disdain, disgust.
At the very moment when Quasimodo was passing the Pillar House, a man darted from the crowd to tear from his hands, with a gesture of anger, his crosier of gilded wood – the emblem of his mock popeship.
This man was the man with the bald brow, who, a moment earlier, chilled the poor gypsy with his words of hatred. Gringoire, who had not noticed him up to that time, recognized him: “Hold!” he said. “’tis my master, Dom Claude Frollo, the archdeacon! What the devil does he want of that old one-eyed fellow?”
A cry of terror arose, in fact. Quasimodo threw himself from the plank. He leaped to the priest, looked at him, and fell upon his knees.
The priest tore off his tiara, broke his crozier, and rent his tinsel cope.
Quasimodo remained on his knees, with head bent and hands clasped. Then there was a strange dialogue of signs and gestures, for neither of them spoke.
The archdeacon gave Quasimodo a powerful shake, made him a sign to rise and follow him.
Quasimodo rose and walked in front of him.
Both were allowed to plunge into a dark and narrow street, where no one dared to go after them.
Chapter III
The Inconveniences of Following a Pretty Woman through the Streets in the Evening
Gringoire set out to follow the gypsy at all hazards. He had seen her, accompanied by her goat, take to the Rue de la Coutellerie.
“Why not?” he said to himself.
He walked along, very thoughtfully, behind the young girl. She hastened her pace and made her goat trot.
“After all,” he half thought to himself, “she must lodge somewhere; gypsies have kind hearts. Who knows?—”
The streets were becoming blacker and more deserted every moment. The curfew had sounded long ago. Gringoire had become involved, in his pursuit of the gypsy, in the labyrinth of alleys, squares, and closed courts.
The young girl’s attention had been attracted to him for the last few moments; she had repeatedly turned her head towards him with uneasiness.
He dropped his head, began to count the paving-stones, and tried to follow the young girl at a little greater distance, when, at the turn of a street, which had caused him to lose sight of her, he heard her utter a piercing cry.
He hastened his steps.
The street was full of shadows. Nevertheless, he saw the gypsy struggling in the arms of two men. The poor little goat, in great alarm, lowered his horns and bleated.
“Help! Gentlemen of the watch[5]!” shouted Gringoire, and advanced bravely. One of the men who held the young girl turned towards him. It was Quasimodo.
Gringoire did not take to flight, but neither did he advance another step.
Quasimodo came up to him, tossed him four paces away on the pavement with a backward turn of the hand, and plunged rapidly into the gloom, bearing the young girl folded across one arm like a silken scarf. His companion followed him, and the poor goat ran after them all, bleating.
“Murder! Murder!” shrieked the unhappy gypsy.
“Halt, rascals, and give me that wench!” suddenly shouted in a voice of thunder.
It was a captain of the king’s archers, armed from head to foot, with his sword in his hand.
He tore the gypsy from the arms of the dazed Quasimodo, threw her across his saddle, and at the moment when the terrible hunchback, recovering from his surprise, rushed upon him to regain his prey, fifteen or sixteen archers, who followed their captain closely, made their appearance, with their two-edged swords in their fists.
Quasimodo was surrounded; he roared, he foamed at the mouth, he bit. His companion had disappeared during the struggle.
The gypsy gracefully raised herself upright upon the officer’s saddle, placed both hands upon the young man’s shoulders, and gazed fixedly at him for several seconds, as though enchanted with his good looks and with the aid which he had just rendered her. Then breaking silence first, she said to him, making her sweet voice still sweeter than usual,—
“What is your name, monsieur le gendarme?”
“Captain Phoebus de Châteaupers, at your service, my beauty!” replied the officer, drawing himself up.
“Thank you,” said she.
And then she slipped from the horse, like an arrow falling to earth, and fled. A flash of lightning would have vanished less quickly.
Chapter IV
Result of the Dangers
Gringoire, thoroughly stunned by his fall, remained on the pavement. Little by little, he regained his senses.
“That devil of a hunchbacked cyclops!” he muttered between his teeth; and he tried to rise. But he was too much dazed and bruised; he was forced to remain where he was.
“The mud of Paris,” he said to himself—for decidedly he thought that he was sure that the gutter would prove his refuge for the night; and what can one do in a refuge, except dream?—“the mud of Paris is particularly stinking; it must contain a great deal of volatile and nitric salts. That, moreover, is the opinion of Master Nicholas Flamel, and of the alchemists—”
The word alchemists suddenly suggested to his mind the idea of Archdeacon Claude Frollo. He recalled the violent scene which he had just witnessed in part; that the gypsy was struggling with two men, that Quasimodo had a companion. “That would be strange!” he said to himself.
The place was becoming less and less tenable.
A group of children rushed towards the square where Gringoire lay, with shouts and laughter. They were dragging after them some sort of hideous sack.
“Ohé, Hennequin Dandèche! Ohé, Jehan Pincebourde!” they shouted in deafening tones, “old Eustache Moubon, the merchant at the corner, has just died. We’ve got his straw pallet, we’re going to have a bonfire out of it. It’s the turn of the Flemish to-day!”
They flung the pallet directly upon Gringoire. At the same time, one of them took a handful of straw and set off to light it at the wick of the good Virgin.
“S’death!” growled Gringoire, “am I going to be too warm now?”
It was a critical moment. He was caught between fire and water; he made a superhuman effort, the effort of a counterfeiter of money who is on the point of being boiled, and who seeks to escape. He rose to his feet, flung aside the straw pallet upon the street urchins, and fled.
“Holy Virgin!” shrieked the children; “’tis the merchant’s ghost!”
And they fled in their turn.
Chapter V
The
gentlemen of the watch – стража
