The reply matched the question so little that the wild laugh began to circulate once more, and Messire Robert exclaimed, red with wrath, —

“Are you mocking me also, you arrant knave?”

“Bellringer of Notre-Dame,” replied Quasimodo, supposing that what was required of him was to explain to the judge who he was.

“Bellringer!” interpolated the provost, who had waked up early enough to be in a sufficiently bad temper, as we have said, not to require to have his fury inflamed by such strange responses. “Bellringer! I’ll play you a chime of rods on your back through the squares of Paris! Do you hear, knave?”

“If it is my age that you wish to know,” said Quasimodo,