The inhabitants of the Rue Maugout, astounded by the sight of Geneviève arm in arm with the overshadowing Javogues, had not recovered from the shock of this evidence of human feeling in their tyrant when the next day brought them a further surprise.
Toward five in the afternoon Dossonville, with the evident purpose of impressing his enemies by a new accession of strength, made his appearance, with a body-guard of two. The onlookers, enjoying the amazement of the Marseillais, were yet themselves astonished and perplexed at the incongruity of the new reinforcement.
One, short and contracted, gave the impression that by some mysterious settling his head had shrunk on his shoulders, his shoulders had moved toward his waist, and by this gradual process his whole body had been telescoped into his legs. A huge, flattened nose, or rather beak, imposed itself upon the yellowish, parched face and empty cheeks, while from two slits under the overhanging brows, the half-hidden eyes, without deviating from their forward direction, absorbed the outer world.
His companion, in contrast to the dragging gait of his fellow, moved in short steps, picking up his feet. The sharp nose, set as close as is possible to the perpendicular, pointed the way to the head, which, set forward on the craning neck, seemed in turn to be running ahead of the frail body.
Dossonville, with his loose amble and important tilt of head, gave the cabaret a "Salut!" and continued twirling in his hand for his only weapon an ivory baton a scant two feet in length. Behind him the watch-dogs paused, one grim, taciturn, and furtive, the other loquacious, florid of gesture, and loud, while, as a cur at the approach of a strange dog draws himself up snarling and apprehensive, Javogues and the three half started from their chairs.
Satisfied with the discomfiture of the Terrorists, Dossonville led his followers to the Place de la Revolution, where he found the execution over and the crowd, with a scattering hand-clap, dispersing.
On the terraces of the Tuileries a few spectators still lingered curiously, looking down on the scaffold that violently interrupted the peaceful vista of the woods beyond. Threading his way through the widening network of women, soldiers, spies, muscadins, and laborers, Dossonville perceived Louison, who, having at last quitted the environment of the scaffold, was returning toward the Cabaret de la Guillotine to dispose of her cockades.
"Well, Louison," he cried, "you have a bored air! It was stupid this afternoon, then? The show did not interest?"
"Nothing but a priest to-day—all priests die in the same way," she answered. "However, yesterday it was better. They guillotined twin brothers. That was something out of the ordinary." She added thoughtfully: "It's curious how alike men are on the scaffold."
All at once she perceived the two who had halted obediently at a distance of twenty paces. Dossonville, when her glance had traveled from them to him, and back and forth, in amazement and inquiry, opened his wide mouth and said with pride, indicating them with a flourish:
"Aren't they darlings, though? My assistants, my lambs, my watch-dogs!"
Louison, seized with a sudden, mad laughter, found a moment to say:
"Where, please, did you find such a pair of cutthroats?"
"From the galleys."
"And you trust them?"
"Do you think I'd trust an honest man?" Dossonville exclaimed, with a laugh that left the girl in doubt as to his seriousness. "What is an honest man? A man who has not been sufficiently tempted. Give me the rogue every time. Depend on no man until he is a rogue—a rogue you hold, by his past. With an honest man you are at the mercy of his future." He again designated his assistants. "A word from me would send them to the guillotine. That is the only way to insure tranquillity."
"That's a new theory," Louison exclaimed, much amused. "And there is sense in it. What do you call them, your trusty rogues?"
"You see the short one with the borrowed legs?" Dossonville answered proudly. "I call him Le Corbeau, from his beak and blinking eyes. I picked him up in the Cour des Miracles, ex-beggar, ex-cripple, ex-thief, hidden in a cellar. I offered him protection from arrest in return for services. He accepted; I supplied a coat and a hat, and there he is.
"The other who stands there shaking in the wind is Sans-Chagrin, ex-priest, recanted and reformed. On the subject of our bargain I say nothing, only that I dispose of his neck as easily as mine." Dismissing them by a signal, he took Louison's arm. "Now for us. What do you say to a drop of something in the Rue de Bourgogne?"
"I say, on to the Rue de Bourgogne!"
At the scaffold they made a detour to escape the contact of blood, which made the place abhorrent and carried on the shoes of those who passed in front of the scaffold the red trail for blocks about.
Louison, as they went, was crying her cockades, when suddenly they were aware of a shrinking and a widening in the crowd, and looking up, perceived Sanson, the executioner, and his sons advancing, impassive to all demonstrations. Seized with a mad desire, the girl stepped toward them, crying:
"A cockade, Citoyen Sanson, a red cockade!"
The next moment Dossonville had jerked her away.
"Mordieu, Louison!" he cried angrily. "Why did you do that?"
"Why not?" she said, laughing. "The Revolution has abolished prejudices!"
"It cannot change human nature," he retorted. "You can call him Executor of Public Judgments, Avenger of the Nation, he is always the executioner." He added frankly, "Louison, ma belle, there are really moments when you are not human. At an execution you are like granite!"
"Very well, do not notice me."
"That's easy to say," he grumbled. "Besides, I'm curious."
"Indeed."
"Barabant has been telling me about that extraordinary mother of yours."
"Barabant?" Louison said uneasily. "He doesn't like me."
"I like nothing so well as a mystery," Dossonville continued enthusiastically. "I have three plans already to make her speak."
"Five would do no good."
"Why not?"
"She has left for the provinces."
"Diable!"
"Besides, I do not care to be mysterious," she said impatiently, "and I do not like to be thought strange."
"Speak no more of it," said Dossonville, though inwardly relinquishing nothing of his purpose. "In future I'll consider you only as a commonplace woman."
Louison regarded him maliciously.
"Determine that for yourself."
"Satané de femme!" he exclaimed. "I'll be very careful what I determine. Louison, you are not a woman who can be loved comfortably. I tell it to you frankly. The place seems good; let us sit down."
Several nights later, Dossonville, resting on his rounds, was seated at a table in front of the Café de Valmy, in the Quartier des Bonnes Nouvelles. The bells had announced the midnight; from the intersections of the square the streets yawned to him out of the impenetrable darkness.
For once Dossonville abandoned himself to reverie—a mood evoked by the memory of Louison. Since his encounter, the mystery of her birth had continually teased his imagination. The terror of la Mère Baudrier when Louison had announced the discovery of her father, and again the mother's strange rendezvous in the Square de la Bastille, suggested such an unusual solution, without offering a clue, that his mind returned again and again to the problem.
In another corner, Sans-Chagrin, late in his cups, disputed with the host upon the value of religion, while Le Corbeau, who by his silence gained the majority of the decanter, pretended indifference to the discussion.
"I know what I say," Sans-Chagrin was declaiming. "Religion is a farce and the Assembly will do well to abolish it!"
"That is not so certain," objected the listener.
"It will come."
"Perhaps—"
"Religion will be abolished! I know what I'm saying. I was a priest myself."
"Come, now!"
"True. They expelled me. And why? Why? Tell me that."
"Out with it."
"For instituting reforms. Religion is a farce!"
A woman, scenting a story, issued from the door, and leaning on the shoulder of her husband, said:
"Come, Citoyen Sans-Chagrin, tell us of that."
"I reformed the confessional," Sans-Chagrin began querulously. "Aye, and it needed it, too. Every day and every hour I had to be disturbed for a confession. I said to myself, if there's so much wickedness, it's because the confessional isn't rigid enough. That's logical, isn't it?"
"And what did you do?"
"Only this. I announced that, in future, to avert confusion and to better impress the penitent with his crime, I would hear confessions thus:
"On Monday, all the liars.
"On Tuesday, all the misers.
"On Wednesday, all the slanderers.
"On Thursday, all the thieves.
"On Friday, all the libertines.
"On Saturday, all women who lead bad lives."
His listeners burst out laughing, while the woman said, "And no one came?"
"No one came!" Sans-Chagrin repeated indignantly. "No one came! And the Church, instead of adopting the reform, expelled me. They said I wanted to be rid of confessions. What a farce, my friends, what a mockery!" He spread out his arms in appeal to their judgment, slapped his chest three times, and fell back loosely in his chair, exclaiming, "Oh, oh, oh!"
Dossonville, who had lent a moment's amused attention to this farcical recital, rose and returned to the march, a manœuver which caused Sans-Chagrin and Le Corbeau to choke in their haste to empty the decanter.
They had gone but a short distance when Dossonville's ear caught the slight rasp of a window opening overhead. Flattening himself against the wall, he covered his lantern with his cloak, with a whispered caution to his followers as the window continued to give forth its low complaint. There was a minute's silence, and then it was drawn shut, and the slight click of a bolt was heard.
Hearing nothing further, Dossonville finally resumed his walk, but at the next corner some one muffled in a cloak fell into his arms.
The man, with a dozen pardons, sought to make a detour, but Dossonville's long arm, shooting out, grasped his shoulder.
"Not so fast, citoyen. There's a little formality we must not forget. Name and errand?"
The stranger, perceiving him neither to be surrounded with pistols and knives nor to have a very threatening air, answered:
"Citoyen Clappier, Section des Bonnes Nouvelles. I am hurrying to seek a doctor."
"Show your card of citizenship, and pass."
"The devil!" the man exclaimed, after a show of searching in his pockets. "I forgot to take it out of the coat I wore this morning."
"Really, citoyen, you are in bad luck," Dossonville replied. "I shall be forced to accompany you." He summoned Sans-Chagrin and Le Corbeau out of the shadow, and gave him into their charge, with a "Lead the way!" Then he dropped behind, murmuring, "Provided one does not enter that doctor's by the window."
They journeyed silently for several minutes, until suddenly the three ahead halted, and Sans-Chagrin, returning, said:
"The citoyen wishes to speak with you."
Dossonville, who had expected this dénouement, had the prisoner brought to him.
"Well, citoyen, what is it?"
"Citoyen, I ask a moment's private conversation."
"With me?"
"With you alone."
"It is important, then?"
"Very."
"Good!"
Perceiving that their walk had brought them near to their starting-point, Dossonville led the way to the Café de Valmy, passing through which, he entered a small room, giving orders to his body-guard to remain without. Then shutting the door, he straddled a chair, rested his arms on the back, and with a smile awaited the opening.
"Citoyen Dossonville—" the man began.
"What! You know me?"
"For a long time."
"Indeed!" Dossonville exclaimed, astounded and nonplussed by this knowledge.
"Citoyen Dossonville," the man continued, "I ask of you one promise. If I convince you of my patriotism and my citizenship, will you guard my secret? I ask you as a man of honor."
Dossonville inclined his head.
"Agreed. I promise to keep the secret, on condition that you convince me of your patriotism—that is, by showing me your true card of citizenship."
"That will not be necessary."
Throwing back his cloak, he removed a wig and mustaches, discovering to Dossonville the features of Sanson, the executioner.
"Do you recognize me?"
At this sinister figure, Dossonville recoiled with a movement beyond his control, but recovering, he exclaimed:
"Pardon."
"It is nothing," Sanson answered flatly. "I am used to it."
"Pardon. What surprises me is this," said Dossonville, hiding his own emotion. "That you who have been imprisoned for suspected Royalist interests should expose yourself to suspicion for any cause."
"Have you not guessed my errand?" Sanson said, with a frown.
"Until you disclosed your identity, yes," Dossonville retorted sharply. "But such adventures do not necessitate a disguise at one o'clock in the night. Citoyen Sanson, had I met you otherwise, I should have nothing to say; but disguised and under a false name is different. I shall have to report it."
Sanson reseated himself.
"For thirty years I have assumed disguises and another name. Do you need to be told the reason? You yourself gave it but a moment ago,"—he paused,—"when you recoiled."
"I do not understand," Dossonville said coldly, resolved to push him to the end. "Explain fully. If I am to risk myself thus, I must know all."
"What you cannot understand—you cannot understand!" Sanson broke out irritably, while his eyes sought the face of his captor, doubting the sincerity of the objection. The movement of anger passed; recognizing the peril of his position, he extended his hand and began in a flat, monotonous voice:
"Citoyen Dossonville, it is disagreeable, but I cannot make conditions. Citoyen, I need not tell you that we have always lived apart from society. As far back as we know, every male of our family, from father to son, has been of the same profession. All others are barred to us. Three have tried to bury themselves in the outer world. They were driven back. Every woman has married an executioner, every man a daughter of one. The office I hold was given Charles Sanson in the year 1688. My grandfather, my father, and myself have inherited it. It will descend from son to son, whether King or Republic succeeds. Nothing will ever change that!"
He paused a moment in distaste before continuing:
"When we appear in public, a space is opened to us. We pass in any crowd without touching a shoulder. The poor, to whom we give alms, recoil before our touch. The woman who would speak to us would be cast out, as a pariah. But no woman, recognizing us, would wish to speak to us. We had hoped the Revolution would free us from the universal prejudice—vain hope!" Then, as though he had said enough, he broke off acridly: "And yet you cannot understand why I disguise myself?"
Dossonville, lost in the strange vista which the recital had opened to his imagination, did not at once reply.
"And you keep the secret from every one?" he asked at last.
Sanson, perceiving the question was one of personal curiosity, replied curtly:
"I have said that no woman knowing us has ever spoken to us. I should have said, except one." He smiled, if the curling of his lips could be called a smile. "A bouquetière who was with you one day on the Place de la Revolution."
"The story is on your word alone," Dossonville said, irritated by this allusion. "It lacks evidence."
"Then you do not remember me?" Sanson said.
Dossonville, startled at the turn, for a moment lost his self-possession as he strove to penetrate the allusion.
"Citoyen Dossonville, can you recall the Café Procopé about twenty years ago, and a certain Simon Lajoie who sometimes played a game of checkers with you in the evening, and who inspired you with a great deal of curiosity?"
"Perfectly," Dossonville replied, staring at him in perplexity.
"Do you remember that his visits ceased the day your interest prompted you to follow him from the café?"
"What!" Dossonville cried, rising, and extending his hand in question. "It was—?"
"It was I."
"Tonnerre de Dieu!"
And falling back, he stared in empty, stupid amazement.
"Are you convinced?"
"I am."
"I hold your promise?"
"Yes."
Sanson readjusted his disguise, while Dossonville sought some pretext to retain him and make him talk.
"Citoyen, one question."
"Well, what?"
"I should like to know," Dossonville said, "does the popular hatred affect you?"
Sanson frowned, hesitated, and then answered in two words eloquent with meaning:
"Not now."
Then, without offering his hand, he turned, saying peremptorily:
"Adieu!"
Sans-Chagrin and Le Corbeau, who would not have allowed the devil himself to pass without an order, brought him back. Then Dossonville, springing to his feet, cried:
"Set the Citoyen Clappier free! The Citoyen Clappier is an industrious patriot!"
Cramoisin, since the day of his humiliation before Geneviève, had vented his spite on Barabant, seeking thus his vengeance on Nicole. Several times, in measure as the trial of the Girondins neared its end and it became evident that their condemnation was inevitable, he had sounded Javogues on the score of Barabant, only to be repulsed with decided negatives. But each defeat, by feeding fuel to his hatred, only increased his determination. Convinced, at length, that nothing could be accomplished for the present through Javogues, he had recourse to la Mère Corniche, hoping to find in her an ally.
The shrewd little woman was not long in perceiving his intention. So having sufficiently enjoyed his timid skirmishes, she summoned him to her early one morning, after the distribution of bread, and said point-blank:
"Out with it. What do you want to say to me?"
The face of Cramoisin artfully showed surprise.
"Come, old fellow, let us understand each other. You hate Barabant, eh?"
"Barabant is a Girondin," Cramoisin ventured, and then, deceived by her mood, he plunged on: "He is a Moderate, a contre-Révolutionnaire. He is against Robespierre and the Jacobins."
"Not a bit," la Mère Corniche interrupted, having now entrapped him. "He is a follower of the great Marat!"
"Who are you telling that to!" Cramoisin cried contemptuously.
"Hark, old fellow, no airs with me," the concierge retorted sharply. "The Citoyen Barabant came here with a letter to Marat. I saw it. As for you, I know what you're after, my fine patriot,—your eyes are on the girl!"
Cramoisin, now thoroughly alarmed, sought only to retreat.
"Never in the world," he cried indignantly. "Come, mother, you mustn't wrong a fellow-patriot. I bear no hatred to Barabant. I thought him a Girondin; he is always with that cursed Goursac. But if you say he's not, I'm glad to hear it."
"Oui dà, of course you are! You look it," she retorted scornfully. "Come, get out of my way; leave me in peace, old hypocrite. You don't fool me an instant. Be off!"
Cramoisin escaped to the cabaret; la Mère Corniche, mumbling to herself, settled back in her chair; as the distribution of bread ended, the lodgers issued forth with buckets, to get water from the Seine. Resolved to put Barabant on his guard, she had stopped him, when, to her delight, she perceived Cramoisin disappearing into the cabaret in such pitiful fright that she made a pretext and allowed Barabant to depart, resolved to prolong for a few days the agony of the terrified bully.
She began the round of inspection which, at the expense of her strength, she never failed to accomplish each morning. She passed through the empty rooms, scenting and prying, fumbling among papers and garments, viewing one room with a glance, ransacking another for the taint of aristocracy or the earmarks of a traitor.
Arrived on Barabant's landing, she made a satisfied, careless survey of the room, entering to rest from her labors. On a chair, in a state of mending, was the blue redingote the young fellow had worn on his arrival. More from habit than from suspicion, she ran her fingers through the pockets, and drew out the paper they encountered. It was the envelop addressed to Jean Paul Marat.
She regarded it stupidly, contracting her brows, seeking an explanation, before, with a cry, she tore it open. A sheet, empty and white, slipped to the floor. La Mère Corniche, overcome by the evidence of the duplicity, fell back against the wall.
It was five minutes before she could realize how she had been duped. Then from the miser, and the devotee of Marat, a long howl of rage broke forth, and clutching the letter, she fell from the landing, rather than descended the stairs, gained her room, and abandoned herself to the transports of her rage.
A half-hour later she hobbled forth, white but controlled, to the entrance, where, perceiving Cramoisin, she cried with a furious gesture:
"Come here."
At this angry summons the Terrorist would have slunk away had not la Mère Corniche cut off his escape, crying:
"Cramoisin, idiot, imbecile, come here!"
She seized him, trembling at her tone, and impelled him into the entrance, exclaiming:
"You hate Barabant? Answer me, you hate him!"
"I swear—" he began, when she cut him short: "Fool, I despise him! Do you hear me? I despise him!"
While Cramoisin remained, with gaping mouth, incapable of words, the old woman poured out her reviling. At last he asked, in amazement:
"What do you want of me?"
"I want your help to destroy him."
"Then why didn't you say so at first?"
Fearing to be forced into explanations, she abated her fury and more calmly demanded:
"You have a plan; what is it?"
"It's true?" Cramoisin said, still unconvinced. "You'll join me?"
"I swear it."
"We can't convince Javogues," Cramoisin began, "unless we can make Nicole betray him."
"But how?"
"Jealousy."
"Jealousy? Is there cause? Do you know anything?"
"What is necessary we can invent."
"She won't believe it."
"She'll believe it when she hears it from three persons," Cramoisin said, ruffling up his nose and sneering. "A woman'll believe anything three persons tell her. With Boudgoust and Jambony, we are four."
"Is that your plan?" she cried, in disappointment. "It's stupid, impossible!"
Cramoisin continued to argue with her its merits; she accorded it a grunt, then a shake of the head, and finally said:
"Well, yes; it may do. We can try."
"It's agreed, then. We must excite her suspicions,—but nothing definite."
"What, are you going to give me instructions!" la Mère Corniche cried irately. "As though I couldn't handle a woman!"
"Touch hands, then; it's agreed?"
"Yes."
"You must speak the first word," he said hurriedly. "It will be better." Shutting off a reply, he departed, leaving the concierge scowling and angry.
"Oui dà, I'll speak the first word, old schemer. He doesn't want the woman to lay it to him, the toad!"
The next morning, as Nicole was leaving for the flower-market, la Mère Corniche called to her.
"Eh, Nicole, stop a moment." The girl, who feared her, approached reluctantly.
"You're going to the market?"
"Yes."
"To-morrow is Sunday. I want to put some flowers on the tomb of Marat. See what is going cheap this morning and tell me."
"Is that all?"
"You must stop from time to time to give me news," continued la Mère Corniche, taking her hand.
"You know as much as I do."
"You sell flowers every day?"
"Yes."
"Your man doesn't earn enough, then?"
"With the price of food where it is one can't earn too much."
"You are happy?" the old woman asked brusquely.
"Why do you ask that?" Nicole replied, resenting the question.
"There, don't get angry. You may have friends you don't know of." She released her hand, adding: "If you suspect nothing, I'll say no more."
Penetrating readily the stratagem, Nicole laughed over the encounter, and, perceiving the bald attempt to rouse her jealousy, she dismissed the conversation contemptuously from her mind.
Toward midday, however, the insinuation returned, and forgetting her first attitude, she suffered a little at the very shadow of what her imagination could conjure up. She ended by again laughing at her simplicity, nor did her mind recur again to the thought during the day.
That evening, as she passed in front of the Prêtre Pendu, she encountered Cramoisin, who watched her from the corners of his eyes, rubbing his splayed thumb over his lip in such an ironical fashion that she stopped and demanded impatiently:
"Well, what is it? I seem to amuse you."
"Eh, perhaps you do."
"Come, what do you mean by such looks!"
Then rising, he looked her a moment in countenance, and replied:
"Nicole, they told me you were clever."
"Well, what does that mean?"
"It means that you are either very stupid," he said curtly, "or very blind."
Nicole mounted the steps in perplexity, arresting her journey at every landing to ask herself anxiously what he could have meant. In her room she remained blankly at the window, forgetting the meal she had to prepare. Several times she passed her hand across her forehead, as though to rout the unquiet thoughts, but always returned to the same reverie. The church bell ringing five aroused her, and, ashamed to have yielded to such doubts, she said angrily:
"Come, I'm an idiot! I'll tell the whole affair to Barabant when he returns and we will laugh at it together."
Yet when he entered, her resolution forgotten, she rose quickly, and taking him by the arms, looked anxiously in his face.
"What is the matter with you?" he asked. "Why do you look at me so curiously?"
"I was afraid you would do something rash," she said evasively. "What—what of the Girondins?"
"It is hopeless. To-morrow they may be condemned." But only half satisfied, he returned to the question. "Was that all you wanted to know? You looked at me very queerly."
"I don't doubt it," she said quickly. "Ah, Barabant, I am so afraid that you will compromise yourself with them."
"I must decide—and you would not have me a coward, Nicole?"
She defended her position, she repeated the old arguments, she tried to win him from the thought of sacrifice; but of what had happened during the day she said not a word.
"It is getting late," she exclaimed finally. "I must get into line."
"Let me take the whole night," he pleaded; "you are tired."
"No, no. Not at all."
She hurried below, furious at herself for having betrayed to him her unrest, but when she remembered how instantly he had noticed the strangeness of her look, she could not help thinking that a little suspicious.
The next morning she prepared to meet the concierge with a new defiance, but la Mère Corniche did not even raise her head. Cramoisin, to her relief, was absent; only Boudgoust and Jambony were lounging in front of the cabaret. She cast a furtive glance in their direction; they were laughing boisterously.
"They are laughing at me," she thought, all her doubts returning.
She passed a miserable morning, tortured by the fears that now seemed always to have been with her. Unable to bear the tumult within her breast, she determined to recount all to Barabant. If anything existed, she must know it definitely.
Unfortunately, the arrival of Dossonville, who joined them at lunch on the boulevards, prevented the confidence, and during the meal another suggestion added to her suffering. Barabant, in speaking of Dossonville's interest in Louison, expressed his astonishment at the attraction, ending peremptorily:
"As for me,—she repels me."
He had put considerable warmth into his criticism; that and the simple declaration of antagonism made havoc in the imagination of Nicole. She thought the opinion obviously unnecessary. She asked herself if he really were interested in Louison, whom she had always feared, would he not have said exactly what he had. But from logical inquiry she soon flew to conjecture and supposition, to weighing each word and action and seeking a hidden meaning. She thought no longer of confiding in Barabant, but held herself on her guard.
She was not convinced—she but half believed; yet she returned sadly. Her dream was over. Whatever might come, the first breath of jealousy had entered her heart, and, rightly or wrongly, she knew that her tranquillity had departed forever.
The Place de la Revolution was choked with the multitude come to witness the end of the Girondins. The populace, indifferent to the sight of two or three executions a day, gathered with common impulse to witness these men, long lifted above their heads, go down to their death in humiliation and disgrace. Many who hungered, cursed them in the need of some object to their hatred; others who feared them, in the savage joy of deliverance; but the mass hooted simply from the delight of seeing them fallen.
Toward one o'clock the procession of five carts, announced by all the tumults of the human voice, cut through the frenzied hordes, who from time to time fell back into silence, astonished at the demeanor of these men; who to insults addressed the crowds with cries of "Vive la République!" or joined in the chorus of the "Marseillaise."
The rumor had circulated that the body of Valazé, who had committed suicide the night before, was to be guillotined with the rest. In the last cart, indeed, the people discovered the corpse stretched among the living.
Arrived at the scaffold, the twenty descended; the one remained. A jailer, to win a laugh, propped up the corpse, crying:
"Hurry up—Valazé's waiting for you."
The crowd applauded with jeers and taunts. The Girondins meanwhile ranged themselves at the foot of the scaffold. When their number was complete, with one movement they embraced.
Several, turning toward the public, lifted up their arms and repeated the cry:
"Vive la République!"
Then, drawn up one against the other, giving front to the torrent of their enemies, forgetting even their individualities in the supreme moment, the condemned began the hymn of the Republic:
Every two minutes one of the fraternity left the ranks and ascended the ladder; but the chorus continued, uninterrupted either by the wild acclaim that greeted the appearance of each victim on the scaffold, or by the thundering shout that told of the severed head.
The chorus thinned to three, to two, to one. The last, without ceasing the chant, mounted to the platform; only the knife interrupted the song.
Then, as far as the eye could travel, over the immense square, over the packed bridges and distant, darkened streets, like an immense flight of released birds there appeared above the crowd the red flutter of agitated liberty-caps. The populace, who believed that from out this hecatomb would come relief from famine, bread and meat to save them, shouted frantically. They also shouted who feared to be silent. The uproar continued for ten minutes before the mass disintegrated.
As Goursac, with heavy heart yielding to the impulse of the crowd, sought his friends, from whom he had separated for the sake of prudence, a touch on his arm checked his progress. To his surprise, he encountered the solemn face of Le Corbeau.
"What do you wish?"
"To talk with you," the lips answered, but the eyes said, "You are under arrest."
"I was expecting it," he replied calmly, "but not from this quarter." He sought his friends, but the movement of the crowd had divided them. "After all, it is better so," he said to himself; "farewell would be equivalent to a warrant." He turned to his captor: "Where are you taking me?"
Le Corbeau, without change of feature, ignored the question and kept the silence. Resigning himself to the situation, Goursac allowed himself to be conducted with the crowd; but all at once, as they entered the Rue Antoine, he felt an impress on his other arm and another voice saying:
"This way."
This time he perceived Sans-Chagrin, who, without other recognition, drew him off the thoroughfare. They penetrated abruptly into a nest of narrow streets, winding and twisting in a manner that left him completely in doubt as to their direction. But as their general progress seemed to be leading them toward the Cour des Miracles, that cesspool of beggars, thieves, and cutthroats, he began to fear that this capture had some other design in view than his imprisonment.
He quitted his attitude of indifference and summoned all his faculties to find a reason for this strange course. Observing that at each corner they turned his captors were forcing him into a wider circle, the conviction grew in him that they took this subterfuge to see if they were followed. At the next corner he himself turned—without success. But at the third attempt he distinguished, lurking behind, the three incongruous figures of Cramoisin, Boudgoust, and Jambony!
Then no longer doubting that he was being led to his death, he resolved that no weakness of his should add to the satisfaction of his enemies.
But at this moment, as for the twentieth time they turned a corner, he was seized under the arms and rushed at a run down an alley. Through an entrance in the end he was propelled through courts, hallways, and passages innumerable, and suddenly emerged into a distant street.
Goursac, now utterly at a loss, made no resistance to this sudden doubling. Only when, after a few anxious blocks, he perceived that they were no longer followed, he again sought to enter into conversation with Sans-Chagrin, to be met by the same obstinate silence.
Their attitude increased his perplexity, which was now augmented by their totally ignoring the direction of the prisons and striking out for the barriers of the city. Not until the Barrière du Trône Renversé itself was in sight did his captors stop. Entering an inn, they gave a sign of recognition to the host, passed down a hallway, and pushed their prisoner into a large room, where he found himself in the presence of Dossonville. At the sight of the agent de sûreté, Goursac drew himself up haughtily.
"So, Citoyen Dossonville, you turn with the wind," he said. "I did not suspect your versatility."
"Heavens, my dear Goursac, yes!" cried Dossonville. "But if I go with the wind, I hope to be of some use to those who oppose it." He pointed to the table. "That package will interest you."
"There is some mistake," Goursac said, as he scanned the document. "This is a passport for the Citoyen Jacques Monestier."
"Well, what of that—Citoyen Monestier?"
Goursac looked at the passport, and from it to the laughing countenance of Dossonville.
"Then it was to save me," he said slowly, "that you had me arrested?"
"Parbleu! You are waking up!"
With one bound, Goursac caught Dossonville in his arms.
"Pardon, pardon! What a fool I am!" he cried. "My noble, my generous friend! Head of an ass that I have on my shoulders! You risk your life for mine! Thanks, thanks; a thousand times, thanks!"
"Good!" Dossonville broke in. "We understand each other now. We have but little time; listen to me." He stopped the other in the torrent of his protestations. "Only remember this, that if a weather-vane turns to every breeze, it relinquishes its base not a jot, not even to the hurricane. I find therein a great moral." He dismissed the thought with a gesture. "Now for you. You must pass the gates immediately. When Javogues discovers your escape, he may give orders to watch all the gates. See here, my friend—you must listen to me."
Goursac was paying not the slightest attention. Seated on a chair, his face aglow, he regarded Dossonville with almost adoration, while from time to time his emotion exploded in words.
"Dossonville, you are heroic! You are sublime! Oh, if I only could acquaint the world with such an action! Magnificent! Heroic! Heroic, I tell you!"
Dossonville, perceiving his joy, thought to himself, "Yes, heroism before death is all very well, but how the hope of life transforms a man!" Aloud he continued, "Take the passport and hurry."
Then Goursac, retreating a step, said but one word:
"No!"
But in the word, with the flash of his eye, with the toss of his head, with the resolution of his lips, there was the eloquence of an oration.
This time it was Dossonville who was overcome with astonishment.
"You are mad!" he exclaimed, seizing him by the lapel. "If you return, it is to the guillotine."
"So be it!"
"Reflect."
"I have. Had I wished to save myself, I should have done so long ago."
"Then you seek death?"
"I will not fly from the scum," Goursac said proudly. "I am a Girondin and a Frenchman. When I can no longer live as a Girondin, I am ready to die as a Frenchman. Liberty? What do you offer me? Exile and a daily cringing from discovery, a miserable, hunted existence in the mud and rain? No!" He took a step forward and grasped his hand. "For what you have risked for me accept my benediction; may it bring good luck."
"At least, take the passport," said Dossonville, desperately, holding it out to him, "so that if you change your mind—"
"So that I may not change my mind—there."
With a rapid motion Goursac tore the passport in two, embraced Dossonville, and went out. Before the Prêtre Pendu, Cramoisin, Boudgoust, and Jambony, more dead than alive, hung their heads in terror while Javogues, like a wounded bull, strode backward and forward before them, filling the air with his imprecations.
"Come, you lie, one and all. You lie, Cramoisin; you lie, Boudgoust; you lie, Jambony. He has bought you with gold! You have sold yourselves!"
"I swear they escaped us through some passage!" Boudgoust cried.
"We searched an hour," Cramoisin put in.
"Shut up!"
Javogues seized him furiously by the shoulders, and approaching his gleaming eyes as though to force the truth from his face, he shouted:
"You lie! You lie! I see you lie!"
Abandoning him, he seized Jambony, shaking him like a whip; but as he opened his mouth to roar forth fresh denunciations, he stopped short and dropped the cub in amazement. At the same moment a murmur ran throughout the crowd, which, parting, disclosed the approaching figure of Goursac.
The Girondin perceived his enemies by the same motion of the crowd; but without faltering, he continued nodding to the acquaintances who now shrank before him.
He had passed the cabaret and was almost at the entrance of No. 38 before Javogues could recover. Then, with a roar, he cried:
"Stop!"
Goursac wheeled, returned, and halted.
"What do you wish of me?"
Javogues, brought thus to the long-desired moment, folded his arms and said brutally:
"You do not rejoice, citoyen, at the death of traitors."
"I always rejoice at the death of traitors."
"You rejoice to-day, then?"
"I grieve."
He pronounced the words sadly.
"You are against the Revolution. Say it."
"I believe the Revolution is so great that its ideas can survive even the massacre that you assassins have begun." Then interrupting the catechism disdainfully, he said: "Enough. I should never have survived this day. Arrest me."
Javogues, too overcome with rage for utterance, consigned him with a furious gesture to his body-guard. From all sides went up a shout of hatred and anger. Children and women crowded about, vying with one another to insult the prisoner; men shook their fists in his face and hooted. Amid curses and raillery, the Girondin walked with collected steps, looking into the ranks of his foes with steady eyes.
They had gone but a block when they encountered Nicole and Barabant. At the sight of Goursac in custody, surrounded by the snarling pack, the two, obeying only their generous impulses, sprang forward with outstretched hands:
"What, you, my friend!" Nicole cried, in astonishment and sorrow. "They have arrested you!"
"No, they are liberating me," he answered, with a smile. He pressed their hands. "Adieu, Nicole; adieu, Barabant; and thanks."
But suddenly the voice of la Mère Corniche rose shrilly:
"He is the friend of the Girondin. He is contre-révolutionnaire. Arrest the man Barabant!"
Cramoisin took up the cry.
"He who pities an enemy of the Nation is a traitor. Arrest him!"
Boudgoust and Jambony, joining in, shouted:
"Arrest him! Arrest him!"
In the abject crowd, terrified by these four men, a murmur, a muttering, a rumble, circulated, which it waited to convert into either protest or approval as Javogues should pronounce.
As the Marseillais unwillingly approached, Nicole, dragging Barabant back, whispered in his ear that eternal cry of woman:
"Save thyself. Thy life belongs to me."
"Citoyen Barabant," Javogues said sternly, "did you greet this man as a Girondin?"
"I greeted him," Barabant said slowly, "as a man who has done me kindnesses in the past."
Before this allusion to his own indebtedness Javogues hesitated, but the cries of the crowd urged him on.
"He evades the question!"
"He's a Girondin!"
"Ask him if he's a Girondin!"
The last cry, from la Mère Corniche, imposed itself above the rest.
"Citoyen Barabant," Javogues asked, "are you a Girondin?"
As Barabant hesitated, Nicole sought the glance of Goursac, invoking his aid. The Girondin, who saw no one but her, perceiving her motive, thought bitterly: "I die, and she cannot spare me a look of pity!"
The crowd was clamoring.
"He hesitates!"
"He refuses!"
"Arrest him!"
At their cries, Barabant decided.
"I am not a Girondin," he said.
A chorus of approval greeted the renunciation, but la Mère Corniche, not to be balked, cried:
"He is deceiving us!"
Those who wished to save him called to him: "Cry, Vive les Jacobins!"
Barabant, all escape denied him, shouted:
"Vive la Nation! Vive les Jacobins!"
Then, while la Mère Corniche and the three were silent in helpless rage, the crowd, which adored Barabant, surrounded him, slapping him on the shoulders, shaking his hand, congratulating him. With one accord the shout went up: "Vive Barabant!"
When the shouting died, Nicole heard the rasping voice of Goursac saying to his captors with triumphant sarcasm:
"I see no further need of delay; proceed."
The victory was to the woman, but it was a victory fraught with menace. Nicole understood her danger, but in her anxiety she adopted the wrong defense. On the stairway she infolded Barabant with her arm, seeking to communicate to his depressed body the gaiety and relief in hers, while with all the artifices of the woman who feels herself menaced she sought to belittle the importance of the scene, little realizing the deep wound to the pride of Barabant.
"It was for me you did it," she whispered. "You would not leave me. I alone understood."
He did not answer, and once in their room, fell into a chair, burying his head in his hands. Alarmed at his obstinate silence, Nicole, groping for the right attitude, began to reason, walking the floor in her earnestness.
"After all, mon ami, that is what the Terrorists want—to guillotine the Moderates. Goursac was foolish; he played into the hands of his enemies. You are wise. The duty of the Moderates is to keep silent, to preserve themselves for the good of the Nation. How can you serve the Nation without your head? The times will change, mon ami, and you'll be here to help set things aright."
"Oh, that voice," cried Barabant, "I hear it always."
"Mon ami, you are suffering!" she exclaimed. "I know. I understand."
She threw herself at his feet, trying to separate his hands, seeking to take his head upon her shoulder; but Barabant resisted, saying:
"No, Nicole, no; leave me to myself."
"Don't put me away," she begged. "You are suffering; let me share it."
He took her hands from his neck and compelled her to rise. She went to the window, twice turning to look at the dejected figure that remained unaware of her glances.
"I have made a blunder. Yes, I have made a blunder," she said to herself, pressing her hand against her lips to quell the rising sob. "He blames me."
The next morning she received another shock when he informed her that he wished to be alone all day.
"Then we don't lunch together?" she cried, frightened.
"Not to-day."
Not daring to contradict him, she let him go without a word.
"He blames me. He blames me," she told herself, until all at once, like a thunderclap, came the thought: "Or is it only a pretext?"
Her judgment tumbled before the suggestion, and on the moment she was surrounded by the old doubts. She hurried out, morbidly sensitive to the glances of the concierge, of the loiterers before the cabaret, of the bouquetières her comrades; seeing everywhere mocking glances or looks of sympathy. Despite Barabant's wish and her better judgment, she scoured his haunts with the one desire to know what he was doing.
After a day of agony spent in fruitless travel, she returned to their room, without a glimpse of Barabant. Having prepared the meal, she sat down before the fire to wait impatiently the hour of seven, when he would return. Beside her chair she placed a redingote of his and sewing-material. In the disorder of her mind all her naturalness had departed, and seeking everything with artifices, she wished him to come upon her as she watched their supper and busied herself with his wardrobe.
"That will soften his resentment, perhaps," she thought. "And that everything may be cheerful, I must be singing."
So, when later the stairs gave out the sounds of footsteps, she hurriedly possessed the mending, humming as she sewed; but the steps ceased two flights below. The redingote slipped from her hands, the song stopped, and, overcome with disappointment, she cried:
"Oh, mon Dieu, it is not he!"
When seven arrived and she began to be anxious, she consoled herself with the thought that the effect would be better if he found her waiting without complaint. A burning smell warned her that the dinner was spoiling. She removed the pots from the fire, placing them for warmth in the ashes, and, abandoning all thought of the picture she had imagined, went to the window, where she remained, pressing her hands against her temples, staring into the misty night.
At nine o'clock she returned into the middle of the room, and looking about at the scene of her happiness, she said with conviction:
"It is ended!"
Traveling ceaselessly back and forth like a panther, she cried: "Yes, yes, it is ended!" Still, as long as she repeated it, she continued to hope, and at each fancied creak she ran to the landing, leaning over to catch his first footfall. But when she returned, she still said:
"No, no; I knew it. It is ended—ended!"
At ten she ceased to repeat it,—she was convinced. She collapsed on the bed, brain and body incapable of effort, while the cruel minutes, in their inexorable procession, inflicted each a separate torture.
When midnight announced itself, the last thread of hope snapped within her. She bounded up, lit a candle, descended the flight, and entered the room, calling, "Goursac!"
She had forgotten the arrest. The fact appeared to her as an evil omen, presaging calamity.
In fear of the sepulchral stillness, she fled back, rushing in a panic to her room, where she gazed about helplessly, asking herself what she was to do. All at once, at the window, staring at her old room, she cried:
"If it is Louison!" And emitting an "Ah!" that had in it the note of murder, she passed out of the window.
The night was filled with fog, out of which descended the sharp sting of rain. She moved slowly, her body pressed to the roof, seeing with her fingers until the dormer-window struck against her foot. Once into Louison's room, she crept to the bed, stretching out her hand. It was empty.
"Oh! oh! oh!"
The cry was of something collapsing in her soul. Without returning to her room, she sped down the stairs, through the two courts, and into the street. In her unheeding rush, she turned to the right, missing Barabant, who was at the moment returning from the opposite direction.
When she could run no longer, she dropped into a walk until, recovering her breath, she broke again into a run. At the street corners the bracketed lanterns suffused the fog with a floating radiance that guided her over the glistening, slippery stones. The mist that threatened the world with a destiny of gloom, the rain that gathered on her eyelashes and weighted her hair, she welcomed as the fitting touch to her misery; but the chill abated not a jot of the fever in her veins. Out of the blurred night occasionally long lines of watchers emerged, crouching under shawls, hugging the walls to escape the rain. A dozen brutish arms snatched at her, but eluding all, she arrived, panting and trembling, at her destination, crying to the servant who answered her knock:
"Citoyenne, is this the Committee of Safety?"
"Yes."
"I must see them."
"Do you come to denounce some one?"
"I do."
"Enter."
Nicole found herself in a hall.
"Name, citoyenne?"
"The Citoyenne Nicole, bouquetière. The Citoyen Couthon will know me."
The servant passed to a door at the back and knocked timidly. At the second repetition a voice cried:
"Come in."
The door opened on a group of men about a table littered with papers.
"What is it?"
"A citoyenne who wishes to make a denunciation."
"Name?"
"The Citoyenne Nicole, bouquetière."
"Tiens! I know her," exclaimed a voice. The spokesman, on this evidence, gave a sign of permission to the servant, who ushered in Nicole.
A voice said approvingly:
"Look—she is pretty."
"Haven't the time."
Several, attracted by the exclamation, gave her a casual glance; the rest, without raising their heads, continued the low hum of their conference. From the farther side a man wrapped in blankets, deformed, infirm, seized with sudden chills, greeted her.
"Well, Nicole, you've come to denounce some one? That's right."
"Citoyen Couthon," Nicole blurted, "I—"
At the aspect of these machine-like men industriously busy with the lists that fed the guillotine, all her anger dissolved—she could not pronounce there the name she had loved.
"Well, well," Couthon said encouragingly, "you want to denounce whom? Come, let us get at it. Not the Citoyen Eugène Barabant, at least," he said, with a good-natured leer.
The sound of that name in this spot, without pity, terrified Nicole; she now sought only an excuse to retreat.
"What name's that?" cried a little man from the table. "Eugène Barabant? Wait a moment; wait a moment. Let me search."
Couthon lounged to the side of the speaker, who, turning to his neighbor, demanded the list of suspects to be arrested, while Nicole, flattened against the wall, dazed by a sudden fear, remained trembling at the snatches of conversation that reached her.
"A man offered me one thousand livres to-day if I'd slip in the name of his wife."
"That was cheap!"
"Héron is becoming insupportable. He's sent in the name of every one in his building. To-day it's the woman above him."
"She makes too much noise, no doubt."
"What's the difference? The Nation needs the funds. We must coin money on the Place de la Revolution; the guillotine is the mint of the Nation."
"You're a financier."
"I'm proud of it. Guillotine the rich—there's my finance."
Couthon raised his head.
"That's strange; I too thought I'd seen the name."
The others, attracted by his exclamation, asked:
"What name?"
"Barabant. Eugène Barabant."
A small man spoke up.
"Denounced last night by the Citoyen Javogues and an old hag the size of a child. Do you remember?"
A chorus of assent greeted him.
"Barabant denounced!" Nicole cried. "Barabant denounced!" She extended her hand. "La Mère Corniche?"
"That's the name."
"Come, Nicole, a lover is easily replaced. I've sacrificed two already to the Nation," Couthon cried. "Don't lose your time; denounce your suspect. We are short to-night."
"A pretty patriot like that has right to a dozen suspects," cried another, amid laughter.
Overwhelmed, dizzy, and horror-stricken, she shook her head, felt with her hands until she found the door, and, backing from the room, fled from the house—fled back through the ghostly city.
Goursac's door was opened; Geneviève herself, with solemn face flushed with the light of her candle, was waiting for her.
"Tell me quick!" she cried, apprehending what had happened.
"You know, then?"
"Know what?"
"Barabant has been arrested."
She recoiled to the wall shrieking:
"Arrested!"
"An hour ago."
"Where?"
"Here."
"Here? Then he came back?"
"Yes."
Without waiting to hear more, she fled to their room. The lantern he had lighted shone over the stone floor, the cheerless walls, and the kinks in the roof. It was all empty—terribly empty. On the bed she perceived the belt and the coat he had left. Forgetting her jealousy, her anger, her mission, remembering only that he had returned, knowing only that her dream was ended, she stretched out her helpless arms and cried:
"Barabant! Barabant!"
Then, overcome with hunger, weariness, and the ravages of her emotion, she slipped to the floor in a heap.