Little Dorrit Vol.1 f.014 recto

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The jailer shrugged his shoulders.

“Lady of mine! Am I to lie here all my life, my father?”

“What do I know!” cried ?said cried the jailer, turning upon him with [??????] [??????] southern [??????] quickness, and gesticu *
lating with both his hands and all his fingers, as if he were threatening to tear him to pieces. “My friend, how is it possible for one to tell how long you are to lie here? What do I know, John Baptist Cavalletto? Death of my life! [??????] There are prisoners here
sometimes, who are not in such a Devil of a hurry to be tried!”

He seemed to glance [back] [???????] [??????] obliquely at Monsieur Rigaud . in [???????????????] this remark, but [?????] Monsieur Rigaud had already resumed his meal, though not with quite so ??????? quick an appetite as before.

“Adieu, my birds!” said the keeper of the prison, taking his ???????
pretty child in his arms, and dictating ??????? the words with a kiss.

“Adieu, my birds!” the pretty child repeated.

Her ????????????????????????? ????????? innocent face looked back ???????? so brightly over ???????his shoulder, as he walked away with her, singing singing her the ?????song of the child’s game:

“Who passes by this road so late?

"Compagnon de la Majolaine

"Who passes by this road so late?

"always gay!”

That John Baptist felt it a point of honour to reply at the grate, and in good time and tune, though a little hoarsely:

“Of all the king’s knights “tis the flower,

Compagnon de la Majolaine!

Of all the king’s knights “tis the flower,

Always gay!”

Which accompanied them so far down the few steep stairs, that the prison-keeper had to stop at last for his little daughter to hear the song out, and repeat the Refrain while they were yet in sight. Then the child’s head disappeared, and the prison-keeper’s head disappeared, but the little voice prolonged the strain until the door clashed.

Monsieur Rigaud, finding the listening John Baptist in his way before the echoes had ceased (even the echoes were the weaker for imprisonment, and seemed to lag), reminded him with a push of his foot that he had better resume his own darker place. The little man sat down again upon the pavement with the negligent ease of one who was thoroughly accustomed to pavements; and placing three hunks of coarse bread before himself, and falling to upon a fourth, began contentedly to work his way through them as if to clear them off were a sort of game.

Perhaps he glanced at the Lyons sausage, and perhaps he glanced at the veal in savoury jelly, but they were not there long, to make his mouth water; Monsieur Rigaud soon dispatched them, in spite of the president and tribunal, and proceeded to suck his fingers as clean as he could, and to wipe them on his vine leaves. Then, as he paused in his drink to contemplate his fellow-prisoner, his moustache went up, and his nose came down.

“How do you find the bread?”

“A little dry, but I have my old sauce here,” returned John Baptist, holding up his knife.

“How sauce?”

“I can cut my bread so—like a melon. Or so—like an omelette. Or so—like a fried fish. Or so—like Lyons sausage,” said John Baptist, demonstrating the various cuts on the bread he held, and soberly chewing what he had in his mouth.

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