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officials; they questioned the policemen, but these knew nothing. All
that they could tell was that these police-vans contained eight places,
that in each van there were four prisoners, each occupying a cell, and
that the four other cells were filled by four sergents de ville
placed between the prisoners so as to prevent any communication between
the cells.
After various consultations between the aide-de-camp of the Elysée and
the men of the Prefect Maupas, the two police-vans were placed on
railway trucks, each having behind it the open barouche like a wheeled
sentry-box, where a police agent acted as sentinel. The engine was
ready, the trucks were attached to the tender, and the train started. It
was still pitch dark.
For a long time the train sped on in the most profound silence.
Meanwhile it was freezing, in the second of the two police-vans, the
sergents de ville, cramped and chilled, opened their cells, and in
order to warm and stretch themselves walked up and down the narrow
gangway which runs from end to end of the police-vans. Day had broken,
the four sergents de ville inhaled the outside air and gazed at the
passing country through a species of port-hole which borders each side
of the ceiling of the passage. Suddenly a loud voice issued from one of
the cells which had remained closed, and cried out, "Hey! there! it is
very cold, cannot I relight my cigar here?"
Another voice immediately issued from a second cell, and said, "What! it
is you? Good-morning, Lamoricière!"
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