"Impossible to get in!" he muttered between his teeth.
"An old, enchanted church!" grumbled the aged Bohemian, Mathias Hungadi Spicali.
"By the Pope's whiskers!" went on a sham soldier, who had once been in service, "here are church gutters spitting melted lead at you better than the machicolations of Lectoure.""Do you see that demon passing and repassing in front of the fire?" exclaimed the Duke of Egypt.
"Pardieu, 'tis that damned bellringer, 'tis Quasimodo,"said Clopin.
The Bohemian tossed his head. "I tell you, that 'tis the spirit Sabnac, the grand marquis, the demon of fortifications.
He has the form of an armed soldier, the head of a lion.
Sometimes he rides a hideous horse. He changes men into stones, of which he builds towers. He commands fifty legions 'Tis he indeed; I recognize him. Sometimes he is clad in a handsome golden robe, figured after the Turkish fashion.""Where is Bellevigne de l'Etoile?" demanded Clopin.
"He is dead."
Andry the Red laughed in an idiotic way: "Notre-Dame is making work for the hospital," said he.
"Is there, then, no way of forcing this door," exclaimed the King of Thunes, stamping his foot.
The Duke of Egypt pointed sadly to the two streams of boiling lead which did not cease to streak the black facade, like two long distaffs of phosphorus.
"Churches have been known to defend themselves thus all by themselves," he remarked with a sigh. "Saint-Sophia at Constantinople, forty years ago, hurled to the earth three times in succession, the crescent of Mahom, by shaking her domes, which are her heads. Guillaume de Paris, who built this one was a magician.""Must we then retreat in pitiful fashion, like highwaymen?"said Clopin. "Must we leave our sister here, whom those hooded wolves will hang to-morrow.""And the sacristy, where there are wagon-loads of gold!"added a vagabond, whose name, we regret to say, we do not know.
"Beard of Mahom!" cried Trouillefou.
"Let us make another trial," resumed the vagabond.
Mathias Hungadi shook his head.
"We shall never get in by the door. We must find the defect in the armor of the old fairy; a hole, a false postern, some joint or other.""Who will go with me?" said Clopin. "I shall go at it again. By the way, where is the little scholar Jehan, who is so encased in iron?""He is dead, no doubt," some one replied; "we no longer hear his laugh."The King of Thunes frowned: "So much the worse. There was a brave heart under that ironmongery. And Master Pierre Gringoire?""Captain Clopin," said Andry the Red, "he slipped away before we reached the Pont-aux-Changeurs,"Clopin stamped his foot. "Gueule-Dieu! 'twas he who pushed us on hither, and he has deserted us in the very middle of the job! Cowardly chatterer, with a slipper for a helmet!""Captain Clopin," said Andry the Red, who was gazing down Rue du Parvis, "yonder is the little scholar.""Praised be Pluto!" said Clopin. "But what the devil is he dragging after him?"It was, in fact, Jehan, who was running as fast as his heavy outfit of a Paladin, and a long ladder which trailed on the pavement, would permit, more breathless than an ant harnessed to a blade of grass twenty times longer than itself.
"Victory! ~Te Deum~!" cried the scholar. "Here is the ladder of the longshoremen of Port Saint-Landry."Clopin approached him.
"Child, what do you mean to do, ~corne-dieu~! with this ladder?""I have it," replied Jehan, panting. "I knew where it was under the shed of the lieutenant's house. There's a wench there whom I know, who thinks me as handsome as Cupido.
I made use of her to get the ladder, and I have the ladder, ~Pasque-Mahom~! The poor girl came to open the door to me in her shift.""Yes," said Clopin, "but what are you going to do with that ladder?"Jehan gazed at him with a malicious, knowing look, and cracked his fingers like castanets. At that moment he was sublime. On his head he wore one of those overloaded helmets of the fifteenth century, which frightened the enemy with their fanciful crests. His bristled with ten iron beaks, so that Jehan could have disputed with Nestor's Homeric vessel the redoubtable title of ~dexeubolos~.
"What do I mean to do with it, august king of Thunes?
Do you see that row of statues which have such idiotic expressions, yonder, above the three portals?""Yes. Well?"
"'Tis the gallery of the kings of France."
"What is that to me?" said Clopin.
"Wait! At the end of that gallery there is a door which is never fastened otherwise than with a latch, and with this ladder I ascend, and I am in the church.""Child let me be the first to ascend."
"No, comrade, the ladder is mine. Come, you shall be the second.""May Beelzebub strangle you!" said surly Clopin, "I won't be second to anybody.""Then find a ladder, Clopin!"
Jehan set out on a run across the Place, dragging his ladder and shouting: "Follow me, lads!"In an instant the ladder was raised, and propped against the balustrade of the lower gallery, above one of the lateral doors. The throng of vagabonds, uttering loud acclamations, crowded to its foot to ascend. But Jehan maintained his right, and was the first to set foot on the rungs. The passage was tolerably long. The gallery of the kings of France is to-day about sixty feet above the pavement. The eleven steps of the flight before the door, made it still higher.
Jehan mounted slowly, a good deal incommoded by his heavy armor, holding his crossbow in one hand, and clinging to a rung with the other. When he reached the middle of the ladder, he cast a melancholy glance at the poor dead outcasts, with which the steps were strewn. "Alas!" said he, "here is a heap of bodies worthy of the fifth book of the Iliad!" Then he continued his ascent. The vagabonds followed him. There was one on every rung. At the sight of this line of cuirassed backs, undulating as they rose through the gloom, one would have pronounced it a serpent with steel scales, which was raising itself erect in front of the church.
Jehan who formed the head, and who was whistling, completed the illusion.
