You can't live with those people any longer. And you
oughtn't to, you know, after this. You give me the paper, and you move
away."
"It seems very flighty in me to be taking a new place at this time of
life," observed Mrs. Bread, lugubriously. "But if you are going to turn
the house upside down, I would rather be out of it."
"Oh," said Newman, in the cheerful tone of a man who feels rich in
alternatives. "I don't think I shall bring in the constables, if that's
what you mean. Whatever Madame de Bellegarde did, I am afraid the law
can't take hold of it. But I am glad of that; it leaves it altogether to
me!"
"You are a mighty bold gentleman, sir," murmured Mrs. Bread, looking at
him round the edge of her great bonnet.
He walked with her back to the chateau; the curfew had tolled for the
laborious villagers of Fleurieres, and the street was unlighted and
empty. She promised him that he should have the marquis's manuscript in
half an hour. Mrs. Bread choosing not to go in by the great gate, they
passed round by a winding lane to a door in the wall of the park, of
which she had the key, and which would enable her to enter the chateau
from behind. Newman arranged with her that he should await outside the
wall her return with the coveted document.
She went in, and his half hour in the dusky lane seemed very long.
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