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"Yes, it is midnight."
The clock struck a thirteenth stroke.
Ursus shuddered.
"
Thirteen!"
Then followed a fourteenth; then a fifteenth.
"
What can this mean?"
The strokes continued at long intervals. Ursus listened.
"It is not the striking of a clock; it is the bell Muta. No wonder I
said, 'How long it takes to strike midnight!' This clock does not
strike; it tolls. What fearful thing is about to take place?"
Formerly all prisons and all monasteries had a bell called Muta,
reserved for melancholy occasions. La Muta (the mute) was a bell which
struck very low, as if doing its best not to be heard.
Ursus had reached the corner which he had found so convenient for his
watch, and whence he had been able, during a great part of the day, to
keep his eye on the prison.
The strokes followed each other at lugubrious intervals.
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