The next day the weather was appalling. Nature seemed to be dissolving in
a cold, ceaseless rain--a rain like that which announces the approach of
winter. All the way to the laboratory my ears were tortured with the
criers announcing the names of the condemned, a large number of men,
women, and children. The bloody harvest was over-rich. I should not lack
subjects for my investigations that day.
The day ended early. At four o'clock I arrived at Clamart; it was almost
night.
The view of the cemetery, with its large, new-made graves; the sparse,
leafless trees that swayed in the wind, was desolate, almost appalling.
A large, open pit yawned before me. It was to receive to-day's harvest
from the Place de la Révolution. An exceedingly large number of victims
was expected, for the pit was deeper than usual.
Mechanically I approached the grave. At the bottom the water had gathered
in a pool; my feet slipped; I came within an inch of falling in. My hair
stood on end. The rain had drenched me to the skin. I shuddered and
hastened into the laboratory.
It was, as I have said, an abandoned chapel. My eyes searched--I know not
why--to discover if some traces of the holy purpose to which the edifice
had once been devoted did not still adhere to the walls or to the altar;
but the walls were bare, the altar empty.
I struck a light and deposited the candle on the operating-table on which
lay scattered a miscellaneous assortment of the strange instruments I
employed. I sat down and fell into a reverie. I thought of the poor queen,
whom I had seen in her beauty, glory, and happiness, yesterday carted to
the scaffold, pursued by the execrations of a people, to-day lying
headless on the common sinners' bier--she who had slept beneath the gilded
canopy of the throne of the Tuileries and St. Cloud.
As I sat thus, absorbed in gloomy meditation, wind and rain without
redoubled in fury. The rain-drops dashed against the window-panes, the
storm swept with melancholy moaning through the branches of the trees.
Anon there mingled with the violence of the elements the sound of wheels.
It was the executioner's red hearse with its ghastly freight from the
Place de la Révolution.
The door of the little chapel was pushed ajar, and two men, drenched with
rain, entered, carrying a sack between them.
"There, M. Ledru," said the guillotinier; "there is what your heart longs
for! Be in no hurry this night! We'll leave you to enjoy their society
alone. Orders are not to cover them up till to-morrow, and so they'll not
take cold."
With a horrible laugh, the two executioners deposited the sack in a
corner, near the former altar, right in front of me. Thereupon they
sauntered out, leaving open the door, which swung furiously on its hinges
till my candle flashed and flared in the fierce draft.