"You'll want the fire, I suppose," remarked Mrs. Binter, grudgingly, as if she would like to take it away with her, "an' the lamp. I was goin' to put 'em both out, but if you must, you must. Would your friend like supper?"
"Je ne sais pas," said Monsieur Judas, putting down the tongs and shrugging his shoulders. "No! I do no so tink."
"Supper's extra, you know," observed Mrs. Binter, determined to have out of the supper what she was losing in the lamp and fire; "but it ain't hospital to let a friend go away without a bite. It may be French manners," added the jailer with scathing irony, "but it ain't English."
Monsieur Judas spread out his hands with a deprecating gesture, murmured something indistinct, and then relapsed into silence, much to the disappointment of Mrs. Binter.
"There's two legs of a fowl," said the lady, rattling her keys. "Binter was goin' to have 'em for his breakfast; but I can trim 'em up with parsley, if you like, an' with bread an' cheese an' a bottle of that sour vinegar you call Julia, it'll be quite a little 'oliday for you."
Just at this moment the bell rang, and Mrs. Binter hastening to the front door, admitted Mr. Fanks, took him in charge, and having delivered him over to the safe custody of Monsieur Judas, retired with a final rattle of the keys in deep wrath at her failure with the supper idea.
Octavius, who looked rather pale, but with a stern expression on his face, slipped off his fur coat, and having surveyed Judas with a calculating expression, sat down by the fiction of a fire, the Frenchman taking a seat opposite.
"I do wait for you," said Monsieur Judas, smoothing one lean hand with the other, and letting his eyelids droop over his crafty eyes.
"Speak French," replied Fanks, in that language; "we'll understand one another better if you do."
"Eh, certainly, my friend," said Judas, rapidly, "it is easier for me. You speak French very well; eh, yes, very well, monsieur."
Fanks acknowledged this compliment with a stiff nod, and plunged at once into the object of his visit.
"Now, Monsieur Guinaud, about your friend, Melstane?"
"Eh! a moment, if you please," hissed Judas, in his low, soft voice, holding up his hand. "Before we speak of the poor Melstane let us understand each other, monsieur. That is but right, my friend."