At this moment, the stranger was returning from the Chateau de Cinq-Cygne, where he had apparently passed the night. Goulard resolved to clear up, himself, the mystery wrapped about the Unknown, who was physically enveloped in an overcoat of thick cloth called a _paletot_, then the fashion. A mantle, thrown across his knees for a covering, hid the lower half of his body, while an enormous muffler of red cashmere covered his neck and head to the eyes. His hat, jauntily tipped to one side, was, nevertheless, not ridiculous. Never was a mystery more mysteriously bundled up and swathed.
“Look out!” cried the tiger, who preceded the tilbury on horseback. “Open, papa Poupart, open!” he screamed in his shrill little voice.
The three servants of the inn ran out, and the tilbury drove in without any one being able to see a single feature of the stranger’s face. The sub-prefect followed the tilbury into the courtyard, and went to the door of the inn.
“Madame Poupart,” said Antonin, “will you ask Monsieur--Monsieur--”
“I don’t know his name,” said Gothard’s sister.
“You do wrong! The rules of the police are strict, and Monsieur Groslier doesn’t trifle, like some commissaries of police.”
“Innkeepers are never to blame about election-time,” remarked the little tiger, getting off his horse.
“I’ll repeat that to Vinet,” thought the sub-prefect. “Go and ask your master if he can receive the sub-prefect of Arcis.”
“Monsieur begs Monsieur the sub-prefect to come up; he will be delighted to see him.”
“My lad,” said Olivier Vinet, who with the two other functionaries had joined the sub-prefect before the inn, “how much does your master give a year for a boy of your cut and wits?”
“Give, monsieur! What do you take me for? Monsieur le comte lets himself be milked, and I’m content.”
“That boy was raised in a good school!” said Frederic Marest.
“The highest school, monsieur,” said the urchin, amazing the four friends with his perfect self-possession.
“Mustn’t lower one’s price,” said the infant. “My master calls me a little Robert-Macaire, and since we have learned how to invest our money we are Figaro, plus a savings bank.”
“Oh! some races I make two or three thousand francs--and without selling my master, monsieur.”