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THE MAN WITH THE BLACK FEATHER
179

more to kill?… How many more to kill to be sure of the silence of all?… By the throttle of Madame Phalaris! I had to kill Pepin, the Archer, and Huron the King's Deputy who were in full cry after me one evening, and five archers besides whom I massacred, poor beggars! in Mazarine Street… I see their five corpses still… And yet I'm not at all bad-natured!… I don't want to hurt anybody… I only ask one thing, to be allowed to quietly police Paris, for everybody's security… My chief councillor himself is grumbling. He does n't forgive my executing Jacques Lefebvre… Of course, there's no living with me any longer; but it's only because I wish to live!

"'After that little talk I leave them… I look out of the door of the Queen Margot: Ferronnerie Street is empty. I hurry off; and near the Cemetery of the Innocents I meet Madeline… But I don't tell her where I am going… As a matter of fact, I am going to spend the night in my hole in Amelot Stree [1]

  1. In 1823,when they were cleaning the great sewer under Amelot Street, they found near its principal mouth a recess, a cave, about nine feet square which they still called, in the Official Report, "Cartouche's chamber," because that robber had often been obliged