grades of prisoners,"
said the Governor of the prison.

The Prefecture of police adjoins the Conciergerie, and the magistrates,
like the Governor, knowing all the subterranean passages, can get to and
fro with the greatest rapidity. This explains the miraculous ease with
which information can be conveyed, during the sitting of the Courts, to
the officials and the presidents of the Assize Courts. And by the
time Monsieur Camusot had reached the top of the stairs leading to
his chambers, Bibi-Lupin was there too, having come by the _Salle des
Pas-Perdus_.

"What zeal!" said Camusot, with a smile.

"Ah, well, you see if it is _he_," replied the man, "you will see great
fun in the prison-yard if by chance there are any old stagers here."

"Why?"

"_Trompe-la-Mort_ sneaked their chips, and I know that they have vowed
to be the death of him."

_They_ were the convicts whose money, intrusted to _Trompe-la-Mort_, had
all been made away with by him for Lucien, as has been told.

"Could you lay your hand on the witnesses of his former arrest?"

"Give me two summonses of witnesses and I will find you some to-day."

"Coquart," said the lawyer, as he took off his gloves, and placed
his hat and stick in a corner, "fill up two summonses by monsieur's
directions."

He looked at himself in the glass over the chimney shelf, where stood,
in the place of a clock, a basin and jug. On one side was a bottle of
water and a glass, on the other a lamp. He rang the bell; his usher came
in a few minutes after.

"Is anybody here for me yet?" he asked the man, whose business it was to
receive the witnesses, to verify their summons, and to set them in the
order of their arrival.

"Yes, sir."

"Take their names, and bring me the list."

The examining judges, to save time, are often obliged to carry on
several inquiries at once. Hence the long waiting inflicted on the
witnesses, who have seats in the ushers' hall, where the judges' bells
are constantly ringing.

"And then," Camusot went on, "bring up the Abbe Carlos Herrera."

"Ah, ha! I was told that he was a priest in Spanish. Pooh! It is a
new edition of Collet, Monsieur Camusot," said the head of the Safety
department.

"There is nothing new!" replied Camusot.

And he signed the two formidable documents which alarm everybody, even
the most innocent witnesses, whom the law thus requires to appear, under
severe penalties in case of failure.

By this time Jacques Collin