"He didn't hear nuffin', I'll pound it." The noise of the heavy bolts shooting back broke the spell.

The first detachment were coming down from "exercise." The door was flung back, and the bayonets of the guard gleamed in a ray of sunshine that shot down the hatchway.

This glimpse of sunlight--sparkling at the entrance of the foetid and stifling prison--seemed to mock their miseries.

It was as though Heaven laughed at them.

By one of those terrible and strange impulses which animate crowds, the mass, turning from the sick man, leapt towards the doorway.