Page:Gaston Leroux--The man with the black feather.djvu/164

142 "'Because of the paving-stones?' he said in a tone of surprise.

"'Yes: because the paving-stones in those streets are red. I don't mind red roofs or red-brick walls, but red paving-stones I cannot stand!'

"'And the soil of this Place de l'Hôtel-de-Ville? Is n't it red?' said Adolphe, leaning over me with the air of a doctor listening to the beating of a patient's heart.

"'Do you think I'm colour-blind?'

"'Don't you know that this was the Place de Grève?'

"'Zounds! It was here that the gibbet stood—and the pillory, and the platform on which the wheel was set up! On the days of execution! Facing the entrance of Vannerie Street! I never crossed this Place without saying to my comrades, to the Burgundian, Fancy Man, Gastelard, and Sheep's-head, "We must avoid the wheel." And a lot of use it was to them!'

"Nor to you, either! retorted Adolphe. 'It was here that you were executed! It was here that you were broken on the wheel!'

"I burst out laughing in his face.

"'Who told you that piece of idiocy?' I said indignantly.