Page 1362 - les-miserables

M. Leblanc seemed to have renounced the idea of resis-
tance.
They searched him.
He had nothing on his person except a leather purse con-
taining six francs, and his handkerchief.
Thenardier put the handkerchief into his own pocket.
‘What! No pocket-book?’ he demanded.
‘No, nor watch,’ replied one of the ‘chimney-builders.’
‘Never mind,’ murmured the masked man who carried
the big key, in the voice of a ventriloquist, ‘he’s a tough old
fellow.’
Thenardier went to the corner near the door, picked up a
bundle of ropes and threw them at the men.
‘Tie him to the leg of the bed,’ said he.
And, catching sight of the old man who had been
stretched across the room by the blow from M. Leblanc’s
fist, and who made no movement, he added:—
‘Is Boulatruelle dead?’
‘No,’ replied Bigrenaille, ‘he’s drunk.’
‘Sweep him into a corner,’ said Thenardier.
Two of the ‘chimney-builders’ pushed the drunken man
into the corner near the heap of old iron with their feet.
‘Babet,’ said Thenardier in a low tone to the man with the
cudgel, ‘why did you bring so many; they were not needed.’
‘What can you do?’ replied the man with the cudgel,
‘they all wanted to be in it. This is a bad season. There’s no
business going on.’
The pallet on which M. Leblanc had been thrown was a
sort of hospital bed, elevated on four coarse wooden legs,

1362 Les Miserables