A/N: Since I only gave you a quick and rather unappeasing chapter - I decided to add this one too. It's a little bit longer - but not much. Think of it as my way of apologizing fornot writing more before now. :) Again, comments are ALWAYS welcomed and appreciated. (And the whole I own practically nothing... blah...blah...blah...)
As Adele silently approached the tent, she heard Javert singing as he cleaned up from the evening crowd. But compared to the singing of his captive, his song was no more than a drunken chant and he made Adele want to cover her ears. She peered into the tent, though the thin opening that served as the entrance. The boy still sat in his prison cell, holding his monkey and just like before, he was singing softly.
Javert suddenly reentered from a side room that he had constructed inside the tent. He glared at the boy, "Stop yer singing! No one pays to hear you sing!"
The covered head looked up at him through the bars. "Well, if you hadn't broken my violin…" he said, firmly.
Javert pressed his face close to the cage, "Well if you hadn't such a temper, I'd not have to go and break it!"
"You could have killed me instead!" The boy screamed.
"Aye, that I could have. But it's like I told you earlier. People don't come to hear you sing or play that…" His face twisted into a scowl as he fought to recall the name of the object he had destroyed. "That… thing! They don't even pay to watch you play with that stupid monkey. They pay to see that face of yours. Which is why there is no profit for me to kill you." He paused. "All you'll ever be is a spectacle," Javert continued. "An attraction for people to goggle at; to mock. No one will ever know you by name except the one that I gave you – Devil's child. Here you came and here you'll stay." Javert returned to picking up odds and ends left from the crowd, off the ground around the cage. "Must be hard to know that even your own mother couldn't stand to look at your face."
Adele sniffled a bit from the cold, drawing the attention of the boy. She ducked behind the tent flap, but heard Javert's voice. "What is it? Who's there? Who…." From the spot where she hid, she heard a gagging, choking noise. She peered back into the tent to see Javert leaning against the cage with the boy directly behind him. In the boy's hands was a rope that he had thrown around his owner's neck while the man was distracted. As Adele watched from the entrance, the boy mustered together all his strength to pull on both ends of the rope, cutting off Javert's oxygen. The gypsy master gasped and attempted to fight back – but it was no good. Finally Javert stopped struggling, breathed his last, then his body fell to the ground. From inside the cage, the boy gave his end of the rope a final tug to be sure that his former master was indeed dead, then bent down to grabbed Javert's keys that rested on the ground, only to find that they were too far for him to reach.
Adele now cautiously entered the tent, keeping her eyes fixed on this young killer. The boy caught sight of her and in desperation, he called out, "Mamzelle! Mamzelle, m'aide, s'il vous plait. Please, free me! Quick, before someone comes!" Adele hurried over and grabbed the keys and handed them to the boy. He jammed the correct one into the lock and with a sharp turn, the cage door was open. The boy, still clutching his monkey, ran over to the tent flap and peered out into the darkness. "Someone's coming! Quick, follow me, out the back!" He led Adele through another tent flap and out into the darkness of the night.
Adele then heard voices behind them as he led her onward. "Javert! Someone's killed Javert!"
"It must have been the Devil's child!"
"He's gone! He's escaped!"
"Alert everyone before it's too late!"
A bit of a cliffhanger - but hopefully it will keep you reading... :) Don't forget to review! Thank you!
