He entered the house. Solange followed him; but she, too, pressed my hand
before she entered.
In ten minutes the door was reopened.
"Well?" I asked.
"Your friend," she said, "is worthy of his name; he is as kind and
considerate as yourself. He knows that it will contribute to my happiness
to remain with my father until the moment of departure. His sister has
ordered a bed placed in her room. To-morrow at three o'clock my father
will be out of danger. To-morrow evening at ten I shall expect you in the
Rue Ferou, if the gratitude of a daughter who owes her father's life to
you is worth the trouble."
"Oh, be sure I shall come. Did your father charge you with any message for
me?"
"He thanks you for your pass, which he returns to you, and begs you to
join him as soon as possible."
"Whenever it may be your desire to go," I said, with a strange sensation
at my heart.
"At least, I must know where I am to join him," she said. "Ah, you are not
yet rid of me!"
I seized her hand and pressed it against my heart, but she offered me her
brow, as on the previous evening, and said: "Until to-morrow."
I kissed her on the brow; but now I no longer strained her hand against my
breast, but her heaving bosom, her throbbing heart.
I went home in a state of delirious ecstasy such as I had never
experienced. Was it the consciousness of a generous action, or was it love
for this adorable creature? I know not whether I slept or woke. I only
know that all the harmonies of nature were singing within me; that the
night seemed endless, and the day eternal; I know that though I wished to
speed the time, I did not wish to lose a moment of the days still to come.
The next day I was in the Rue Ferou at nine o'clock. At half-past nine
Solange made her appearance.
She approached me and threw her arms around my neck.
"Saved!" she said; "my father is saved! And this I owe you. Oh, how I love
you!"
Two weeks later Solange received a letter announcing her father's safe
arrival in England.
The next day I brought her a passport.
When Solange received it she burst into tears.
"You do not love me!" she exclaimed.
"I love you better than my life," I replied; "but I pledged your father my
word, and I must keep it."
"Then, I will break mine," she said. "Yes, Albert; if you have the heart
to let me go, I have not the courage to leave you."
Alas, she remained!
Three months had passed since that night on which we talked of her escape,
and in all that time not a word of parting had passed her lips.
Solange had taken lodgings in the Rue Turenne. I had rented them in her
name. I knew no other, while she always addressed me as Albert. I had
found her a place as teacher in a young ladies' seminary solely to
withdraw her from the espionage of the revolutionary police, which had
become more scrutinizing than ever.
Sundays we passed together in the small dwelling, from the bedroom of
which we could see the spot where we had first met. We exchanged letters
daily, she writing to me under the name of Solange, and I to her under
that of Albert.
Those three months were the happiest of my life.
In the meantime I was making some interesting experiments suggested by one
of the guillotiniers. I had obtained permission to make certain scientific
tests with the bodies and heads of those who perished on the scaffold. Sad
to say, available subjects were not wanting. Not a day passed but thirty
or forty persons were guillotined, and blood flowed so copiously on the
Place de la Révolution that it became necessary to dig a trench three feet
deep around the scaffolding. This trench was covered with deals. One of
them loosened under the feet of an eight-year-old lad, who fell into the
abominable pit and was drowned.
For self-evident reasons I said nothing to Solange of the studies that
occupied my attention during the day. In the beginning my occupation had
inspired me with pity and loathing, but as time wore on I said: "These
studies are for the good of humanity," for I hoped to convince the
lawmakers of the wisdom of abolishing capital punishment.
The Cemetery of Clamart had been assigned to me, and all the heads and
trunks of the victims of the executioner had been placed at my disposal. A
small chapel in one corner of the cemetery had been converted into a kind
of laboratory for my benefit. You know, when the queens were driven from
the palaces, God was banished from the churches.
Every day at six the horrible procession filed in. The bodies were heaped
together in a wagon, the heads in a sack. I chose some bodies and heads
in a haphazard fashion, while the remainder were thrown into a common
grave.
In the midst of this occupation with the dead, my love for Solange
increased from day to day; while the poor child reciprocated my affection
with the whole power of her pure soul.
Often I had thought of making her my wife; often we had mutually pictured
to ourselves the happiness of such a union. But in order to become my
wife, it would be necessary for Solange to reveal her name; and this name,
which was that of an emigrant, an aristocrat, meant death.
Her father had repeatedly urged her by letter to hasten her departure, but
she had informed him of our engagement. She had requested his consent, and
he had given it, so that all had gone well to this extent.
The trial and execution of the queen, Marie Antoinette, had plunged me,
too, into deepest sadness. Solange was all tears, and we could not rid
ourselves of a strange feeling of despondency, a presentiment of
approaching danger, that compressed our hearts. In vain I tried to whisper
courage to Solange. Weeping, she reclined in my arms, and I could not
comfort her, because my own words lacked the ring of confidence.
We passed the night together as usual, but the night was even more
depressing than the day. I recall now that a dog, locked up in a room
below us, howled till two o'clock in the morning. The next day we were
told that the dog's master had gone away with the key in his pocket, had
been arrested on the way, tried at three, and executed at four.
The time had come for us to part. Solange's duties at the school began at
nine o'clock in the morning. Her school was in the vicinity of the Botanic
Gardens. I hesitated long to let her go; she, too, was loath to part from
me. But it must be. Solange was prone to be an object of unpleasant
inquiries.
I called a conveyance and Accompanied her as far as the Rue des
Fosses-Saint-Bernard, where I got out and left her to pursue her way
alone. All the way we lay mutely wrapped in each other's arms, mingling
tears with our kisses.
After leaving the carriage, I stood as if rooted to the ground. I heard
Solange call me, but I dared not go to her, because her face, moist with
tears, and her hysterical manner were calculated to attract attention.
Utterly wretched, I returned home, passing the entire day in writing to
Solange. In the evening I sent her an entire volume of love-pledges.
My letter had hardly gone to the post when I received one from her.
She had been sharply reprimanded for coming late; had been subjected to a
severe cross-examination, and threatened with forfeiture of her next
holiday. But she vowed to join me even at the cost of her place. I thought
I should go mad at the prospect of being parted from her a whole week. I
was more depressed because a letter which had arrived from her father
appeared to have been tampered with.