The hip had finished.

"Sign your name, here," he said, and I did. He looked about in one of the
tomes and checked something opposite my name, which I enjoyed seeing in
the list of inmates. It had been spelled, erased, and re-spelled several
times.

Monsieur le Gestionnaire contemplated my signature. Then he looked up,
smiled and nodded recognition to someone behind me. I turned. There stood
(having long since noiselessly entered) The Fencer Himself, nervously
clasping and unclasping his hands behind his back and regarding me with
approval, or as a keeper regards some rare monkey newly forwarded from
its habitat by Hagenbeck.

The hippo pulled out a drawer. He found, after hunting, some notes. He
counted two off, licking his big thumb with a pompous gesture, and having
recounted them passed them heavily to me. I took them as a monkey takes a
cocoanut.

"Do you wish?"--the Gestionnaire nodded toward me, addressing the Fencer.

"No, no" the Fencer said bowingly. "I have talked to him already."

"Call that _planton!_" cried Monsieur le Gestionnaire, to the little
thing. The little thing ran out dutifully and called in a weak voice
"_Planton!_"

A gruff but respectful "_Oui_" boomed from below-stairs. In a moment the
_planton_ of _plantons_ had respectfully entered.