but he is provided with good testimonials, and his papers are all in
order."

"Show me his papers," the mayor said. He took them, read them, reread,
returned them and then said: "Search him." So they searched him, but
found nothing, and the mayor seemed perplexed, and asked the workman:

"What were you doing on the road this morning?" "I was looking for work."
"Work? On the highroad?" "How do you expect me to find any if I hide in
the woods?"

They looked at each other with the hatred of two wild beasts which belong
to different hostile species, and the magistrate continued: "I am going
to have you set at liberty, but do not be brought up before me again." To
which the carpenter replied: "I would rather you locked me up; I have had
enough running about the country." But the magistrate replied severely:
"be silent." And then he said to the two gendarmes: "You will conduct
this man two hundred yards from the village and let him continue his
journey."

"At any rate, give me something to eat," the workman said, but the other
grew indignant: "Have we nothing to do but to feed you? Ah! ah! ah! that
is rather too much!" But Randel went on firmly: "If you let me nearly die
of hunger again, you will force me to commit a crime, and then, so much
the worse for you other fat fellows."

The mayor had risen and he repeated: "Take him away immediately or I
shall end by getting angry."

The two gendarmes thereupon seized the carpenter by the arms and dragged
him out. He allowed them to do it without resistance, passed through the
village again and found himself on the highroad once more; and when the
men had accompanied him two hundred yards beyond the village, the
brigadier said: "Now off with you and do not let me catch you about here
again, for if I do, you will know it."

Randel went off without replying or knowing where he was going. He walked
on for a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes, so stupefied that he no
longer thought of anything. But suddenly, as he was passing a small
house, where the window was half open, the smell of the soup and boiled
meat stopped him suddenly, and hunger, fierce, devouring, maddening
hunger, seized him and almost drove him against the walls of the house
like a wild beast.

He said aloud in a grumbling voice: "In Heaven's name! they must give me
some this time!" And he began to knock at the door vigorously with his
stick, and as no one came he knocked louder and called out: "Hey! hey!
you