little pout had furnished Gringoire with food for thought. There
was certainly both disdain and mockery in that graceful grimace. So he
dropped his head, began to count the paving-stones, and to follow the
young girl at a little greater distance, when, at the turn of a street,
which had caused him to lose sight of her, he heard her utter a piercing
cry.

He hastened his steps.

The street was full of shadows. Nevertheless, a twist of tow soaked in
oil, which burned in a cage at the feet of the Holy Virgin at the street
corner, permitted Gringoire to make out the gypsy struggling in the arms
of two men, who were endeavoring to stifle her cries. The poor little
goat, in great alarm, lowered his horns and bleated.

"Help! gentlemen of the watch!" shouted Gringoire, and advanced bravely.
One of the men who held the young girl turned towards him. It was the
formidable visage of Quasimodo.

Gringoire did not take to flight, but neither did he advance another
step.

Quasimodo came up to him, tossed him four paces away on the pavement
with a backward turn of the hand, and plunged rapidly into the gloom,
bearing the young girl folded across one arm like a silken scarf. His
companion followed him, and the poor goat ran after them all, bleating
plaintively.

"Murder! murder!" shrieked the unhappy gypsy.

"Halt, rascals, and yield me that wench!" suddenly shouted in a voice of
thunder, a cavalier who appeared suddenly from a neighboring square.

It was a captain of the king's archers, armed from head to foot, with
his sword in his hand.

He tore the gypsy from the arms of the dazed Quasimodo, threw her across
his saddle, and at the moment when the terrible hunchback, recovering
from his surprise, rushed upon him to regain his prey, fifteen or
sixteen archers, who followed their captain closely, made their
appearance, with their two-edged swords in their fists. It was a squad
of the king's police, which was making the rounds, by order of Messire
Robert d'Estouteville, guard of the provostship of Paris.

Quasimodo was surrounded, seized, garroted; he roared, he foamed at the
mouth, he bit; and had it been broad daylight, there is no doubt that
his face alone, rendered more hideous by wrath, would have put the
entire squad to flight. But by night he was deprived of his most
formidable weapon, his ugliness.

His companion had disappeared during the struggle.

The gypsy gracefully raised herself upright upon the officer'