"I am no torturer," said Pierre. "I am the warder."
"Warder only, eh? You get the torture ready and stand aside for some one with a tougher stomach to do the mangling. Yet by the look of your face, I think I'm wronging you. Those eyes of yours have a light in them that speaks of a better nature than your words imply."
"I have to obey my orders. You are a soldier they say, and should know that. Why are you placed here?"
"That's a question I could better put to you. To watch you set those instruments running smoothly for my poor bones, maybe."
"'Tis a sight many a brave man has quailed at seeing. But I mean, what is your crime; what have you done?"
"As much as many of the Governor's prisoners probably; that is, nothing."
"Then these are to find the offence."
Gerard laughed lightly.
"You've a pleasant wit, warder. What's your name?"
"Pierre Delmont."
"And so you think, Pierre, that I am to be put in the embrace of some one of those pretty toys of yours in order to induce me to confess to something I haven't done? And I suppose you speak after some experience."
"I have counselled many a man to confess to some light crime rather than face these; and more than one has scoffed at my words to his after sorrow."
"Then you are here to frighten me with thoughts of the torture."
"You are a brave man, I am told; yet many a man brave enough on the field of battle has made his first acquaintance with fear in this cell. God forgive the cruelty of it!"
"I am in no danger, Pierre."
"Yet not for any reasons you know of."
"Surely that sentence has a double sound."
