wounded man. The girl did not even shift her head; while on his chair
Dossonville, like a statue of melancholy, waited the ebbing of life,
musing at this end to their conflict, marveling the while at the
strange antipathies that set men at each other's throats from their
first glance.
All at once Javogues, raising himself on the bed, opened his eyes and
stared at Dossonville, who matched the delirious glance with a quiet
gaze. Javogues, without deviating, stared stupidly, then as suddenly
fell back into apparent insensibility again; while Geneviève, dragging
her body along the floor, wound her arms about the bull-neck and
whispered in his ear.
Again the Marseillais rose and fastened his uncomprehending stare upon
Dossonville. Suddenly, extending his hand, he cried:
"Who's that?"
Falling back, he almost immediately exclaimed:
"It's Dossonville! Ah, Dossonville! Dossonville! Spy! I have you at
last!"
"He is still delirious," Dossonville muttered, drawing breath. "I
thought he saw me."
"I know it by the look in his eyes!" Javogues cried from the bed. "I'll
not give my hand to a spy! Boudgoust, Cramoisin, Jambony, watch him,
follow him! Maillard, if he is acquitted, I swear I'll cut his throat!"
At times he was at the siege of the Tuileries, again in the court of
the Abbaye, or again back in the cabaret of the Bonnet Rouge on the
night of their first encounter. The flash burned itself out again and
he dropped into further insensibility.
A knock was heard on the door. Dossonville, shifting slightly, said:
"Come in."
Le Corbeau and Sans-Chagrin tiptoed in and, at a sign, noiselessly
took their places against the wall. Slight as was the interruption, it
caught the senses of the wounded man and seemed to clear his vision. He
opened his eyes and recognized the room. A moment he remained frowning;
then, turning to the girl, he said with a note of tenderness:
"Ah, Geneviève!"
A sob escaped from the girl.
"What's the matter with you?" he cried, but immediately added: "Ah, I
remember."
Presently he said roughly:
"Tell me, child; what is it?" Then, as the girl buried her face in the
bed to choke the sobs, he answered himself: "It is death."
His eyes fixed themselves on the foot of the bed, and a great breath
passed through his body. Presently a movement of Sans-Chagrin's crossed
his vision, and he raised his glance to Dossonville.
"You are here to see there's no slip," he said scornfully.
"Javogues," Dossonville said impulsively, "I bear you no hatred."
"But I do!" Javogues cried fiercely. "I have never compromised with
you. I'll not do it now." Turning to Geneviève, he regarded her a
moment, and then said softly: "Kiss me, mignonne; I know you love me."
For a moment pain checked his breathing. "Take my hand. That's it.
Don't let go of it."
"Javogues, as a mere formality," Dossonville broke in, "do you wish a
priest?"
"A priest! Yes, a priest!" Javogues cried, with a laugh of scorn. "Spy,
you would make me out a hypocrite!"
"Man, have you no terror of God?"
"There is no God!" With the cry, the Javogues of the mob rose up,
carrying Geneviève to her feet.
"Have you no doubts?"
"Bah!"
"And if there be a God?"
"And if there be a God, I do not fear him!" he cried; and in the Titan
the unconquerable revolt of the Jacobin flamed out. "If there be a God,
he shall answer to me for what he has done! In the name of the slave
and the harlot, I'll accuse him; in the name of the galleys and the
prison, in the name of those who grind out their lives with the labor
of beasts, in the name of the famished and the leper, in the name of
those who groan under kings and aristocrats, in the name of the poor,
who fight for breath, for food, for sleep--in the name of all misery,
I'll accuse him! If there be a God, he shall answer that!"
The effort exhausted him; he collapsed. The listeners, struck with
terror at the audacity of the atheist, composed themselves with long
breaths.
Dossonville transferred his glance to Geneviève bending over the hand
she never quitted. A half-hour passed without a movement from the
girl. It began to grow dark, and on the quieter air the sound of voices
reached them.
Suddenly Dossonville, waiting patiently, saw the girl raise her head
and begin to rub the hand she held. Then she stopped, sank back, and
pressed the hand against her heart.
Presently she raised her head and gazed in perplexity at Javogues. She
half rose, and dragging her body forward, seized the head between her
hands, calling anxiously:
"Javogues, Javogues!"
Almost immediately she recoiled, bounding to her feet, her hands to her
temples, staring aghast, while the cry was torn from her heart:
"He's dead!"
With a scream she rushed past them out of the room, and fled
down-stairs. Dossonville, approaching the bed, looked down upon the
body that was Javogues's. He looked and looked, forgetting all else,
until Sans-Chagrin impatiently touched his arm. Then, with a start, he
came to himself and led the way from the empty room.
XI
NICOLE FORGOES THE SACRIFICE
The Maison Talaru, where Dossonville presented himself the next day,
was the strangest of all the strange prisons improvised to suit
the needs of the Revolution. Crowded with aristocrats, it remained
unmolested, thanks to the enormous sums its lodgers paid for their
security. In return, the inmates passed the time in agreeable
intercourse, gambling, amusing themselves, and eating well. Schmidt,
the jailer, not without a touch of humor, replaced the enormous dogs
which attended his confrères by a peaceable lamb, whose neck and feet,
decorated with pink bows, never failed to reassure the new arrivals.
Placed in his lucrative position by the aid of Dossonville, Schmidt had
nothing to refuse his protector; but, as he was at bottom avaricious,
he met him with an anxious query as to the probable duration of
Nicole's stay.
"What difference can that make to you?" Dossonville replied.
"The fact is, citoyen," Schmidt began cautiously, "the citoyenne has a
room to herself, at your request, which brings me in eighteen livres a
day, which makes five hundred and forty livres a month, which makes six
thousand six hundred livres a year. It's a good sum."
"Mordieu! what gratitude you must bear me, my friend!"
"Yes, yes!" the jailer hastened to say, but with a doubtful inflection.
"The ci-devant Marquis of Talaru has only a little office, and he pays
that price."
"But he is the proprietor, I thought?"
"He rented the place to the section for six thousand six hundred
livres."
"The price you charge him?"
"Yes."
"Good! So he pays you back, for the privilege of remaining a prisoner
in his own home, the amount of your rent. Excellent! And they say we
republicans are lacking in wit! As for you, citoyen, reassure yourself;
the Citoyenne Nicole is here but temporarily."
"Eh, she can stay as long as she wants," Schmidt said hastily, with
an eye to future patronage. "I only wanted you to know that I have
gratitude."
"And its extent," Dossonville replied with a smile. "Lead the way with
your lamb. Did the citoyenne remain quiet? Did she eat anything?"
"A nothing--a sip and a nibble."
Somewhat apprehensive at this symptom, Dossonville approached her room
and entered with a hearty "Well, and how goes it?"
Nicole, still exalted and intense, without replying, came forward,
questioning him with a glance.
"Reassure yourself, Nicole; everything is for the best," he said.
Then, unable to meet the persistent search of her eyes, he admitted
grudgingly: "Javogues is dead."
She inclined her head.
"When you kill a man, you know it. There is an intuition. What do they
say of me?"
"Everything turned out miraculously," Dossonville answered joyfully.
"My men were on guard. No one entered. Javogues did not betray you. The
belief is that you stabbed him to save yourself." Without noticing the
revolt in her eyes, he continued eagerly: "You are in no danger. I have
routed the Tapedures for the present. In a week I'll transfer you to
the Madelonnettes, where I have Barabant safely tucked away. There you
can wait until the tide sets against the Terrorists, and--"
He stopped, perceiving his blunder, while Nicole, smiling a little at
his confusion, said:
"Why do you stop?"
As he began again lamely, she interrupted:
"No, Dossonville, you see as well as I that it cannot be. Why does
every one wish to save me?"
"I do not understand."
"Yes, Dossonville, you do, and you see your mistake. You would make me
out a murderess. I am not a murderess. I gave my life to the Nation
in exchange for Javogues's. I killed him to save Barabant, to save a
hundred others who would perish if he had lived. As a patriot, I killed
him to deliver the Nation of a monster. Only my life can justify the
deed. Don't you see?" She took his hands in hers, saying: "Dear friend,
bring me before the tribunal and I will bless you."
"And Barabant?" Dossonville said desperately.
She shook her head. In her present exaltation all that seemed like
another life which she had renounced for martyrdom.
"And Barabant?" repeated Dossonville.
"Tell him I did it to save him. He will venerate my memory." She added
slowly: "Then I will hold a place in his heart that no woman can ever
take. That will be for the best."
"Nicole, listen to me," cried Dossonville. "Listen, for what I say is
true. Denounce yourself, and you will drag Barabant to his death. Once
admit your reasons for killing Javogues, and Barabant dies as your
accomplice."
"Oh, oh!"
Recoiling before this immense, inexorable obstacle to her purpose,
Nicole fell to her knees, imploring him with her hands:
"No, no, Dossonville, you are telling me that to save me."
"Yes, to save you; but it is true. Decide for yourself, but your
confession sends to the guillotine every friend you have!"
"Dossonville! Dossonville! You are plunging a dagger into my heart!"
"Listen, Nicole; I swear to you it is the truth," he said, raising her
from the floor to a chair. "Denounce yourself now, nothing can save
him. I say no more; decide for yourself."
Leaving her limp with despair, he departed, well satisfied that the
leaven would work and that time and reflection would temper her resolve.
* * * * *
The next day, instead of returning, Dossonville sought out Barabant,
obtaining from the frantic lover a letter to Nicole, which he had
delivered by the medium of Schmidt. Each day, ignoring the demands the
girl sent him by the jailer, Dossonville repeated the same tactics,
confident in the power of lovers' logic to sway her finally.
One misfortune disturbed his triumph. On the day following Javogues's
death, Louison informed him of the execution of Goursac. Dossonville,
who from his fruitless efforts to save the Girondin had retained a
deep sentiment of admiration for him, was much affected by the news,
and yielding to his anger, scoured the city for traces of the three
Tapedures. But despite the most diligent search in café, market, and
boulevard, not a sign nor an echo could he find of the former despots.
On the ninth day of Nicole's imprisonment, Schmidt handed him a word
from the girl, promising to reason over the decision. But Dossonville,
though encouraged, divined that she would meet him with fresh
arguments, and absented himself, until at the end of a week he received
a second message:
"I renounce. Come."
Then, satisfied, he mounted to her room, grumbling to himself:
"Mordieu! one can't talk forever of dying when one is young and is
loved!"
To his alarm, she received him without protestations, while her eyes,
as they regarded him sadly, conceded the victory, but reproached him
for the means.
"I must see him," she said simply. "Take me to him."
"What then?" Dossonville questioned, suspicious of her calm.
"I will do nothing to endanger his life."
"It is a promise?"
"I promise to do nothing that will endanger his life," she repeated
carefully.
"She is still determined to sacrifice herself," he thought. "Mordieu!
what an idea! Barabant will make her forget."
That night, toward eleven, he conducted the girl to Les Madelonnettes
and restored her to Barabant. Only the lantern of the jailer lighted
the sleeping halls as Nicole, with a cry, flew to her lover's arms.
In their happiness they forgot their protector; but Dossonville, well
content, withdrew, drawing after him the guard.
"You seem different," Barabant said at last. "What is it?"
"I have been away from you."
"How could you think of sacrificing yourself?" he said reproachfully.
"I was away from you," she repeated.
"You are here as my wife," he whispered. "Citoyenne Barabant, you
understand?"
"Yes."
"But what is the matter? Why do you cry?"
"It is from joy," she said.
* * * * *
Then for the two prisoners began that weary cycle of the prisons,
days so incredible that even those who survived looked back to them,
doubting their memory. Everything became monotonous; scenes of
heart-rending grief, partings of mothers and children, husbands torn
from their wives, the experience of every day cloyed in the lassitude
that came from too much suffering. Toward six in the afternoon they
assembled in the main halls, listening at first with faltering courage,
and then with indifference, to the turnkey reading the list of those
summoned to the bar of the Revolutionary Tribunal.
The accused passed out, sullen, resigned, hoping, trusting to a straw,
indifferent, tired, and their names were heard no more until the
following day, when a turnkey, with brutal exultation, read the list of
those who had perished on the guillotine.
A shriek, a sob, a curse, perhaps, would be heard, a sudden converging
where a woman had fallen unconscious; but the rest stolidly, dully,
counted the hours to the next summons. New arrivals, the daily
papers, an occasional letter, brought them news of the fantastic,
heaving outer world. It was Frimaire, with tales of the drownings at
Nantes--republican marriages, where man and woman, tied together, were
thrown into the river with brutal jests; Ventose, with its incredible
news that Hébert, the savage Père Duchesne, and the bull-dogs of the
Terror had fallen; Germinal, more amazing than all--Danton the lion and
Camille Desmoulins, beloved of all, swept into the common fate. And all
the time the prisons were bursting with suspects arriving by hundreds
from the sections, faster than the guillotine could serve them.
In Nivôse the names of the Citoyen and Citoyenne Barabant were called,
and hand in hand, without a word, they presented themselves. They
entered the rolling chariot, seeing again the unfamiliar streets; but
it was not to trial that they were borne, but to another prison, the
Bénédictins Anglais. In Germinal they were again called, and once more
expecting death, were again transferred, this time to the Prison des
Quatre Nations, with a glimpse of the sun on the warm waters of the
swollen Seine and the breath of the spring that, as in mockery, brought
to their laps a shower of petals from the flowering trees. Twice again
transferred, they passed through the Hôtel des Fermes and arrived in
Fructidor at Les Carmes.
Here new tortures awaited them from the hands of their captors,
clamoring for measures that would empty the prisons of this constantly
swelling horde of suspects. First, the newspaper was forbidden them,
then all communication with the outside world. On pretext that
the aristocrats were tempting the guards by bribery, a search was
instituted and all money and valuables were seized. Later, another
search was ordered, and all knives, forks, razors, and pins were
confiscated, until for a woman to keep a hair-pin exposed her to
immediate trial.
These tyrannical measures, designed to provoke complaint, failing of
their purpose, the jailers had recourse to petty tyranny, to insults
and jibes. Families were separated that they might feel the force of
punishment due their crimes. Miniatures of loved ones were snatched
from their throats, with the brutal declaration that traitors had no
right to consolation. The vilest bread, spoiled meat, decayed herring,
were put before them, and when still no complaint was heard the
turnkey, nonplussed and furious, exclaimed:
"Damned aristocrats! What, we feed you garbage and you won't complain!"
Of the two, Barabant, tired of the long suspense, no longer retained
any desire to struggle. Nicole alone upheld his resolution,
encouraging, inspiring, invigorating him with her indomitable gaiety.
In the long months, she had gone resolutely and without subterfuge over
the problem of their relations. At first, in the new flush of happiness
at again possessing him, she had yielded weakly, and, banishing from
her mind the inexorable figure of Javogues, she had turned to life and
hope. In the ascendancy that her courage took over the limp resolution
of Barabant she felt in herself a new power, and in him a new need for
her, that tempted her with the bright vision of marriage.
As she began to reason the mood passed. For the first time she saw
him in the company of men of intelligence and education, with whom
he discoursed on things that were to her a closed book. Then she
realized that between Barabant and herself was a gulf of opportunity
and interests which she could never bridge. He too, she soon realized,
felt insensibly the distance between them: she passed for his wife, but
the constant reiteration never suggested to him what it brought to her.
To become his wife was to be a drag to his future; to remain as they
were was to count the hours of her youth. So, vaguely, in a confused
intuition, the girl, struggling to understand what was barred to her,
grew to realize the limitations to her life. It was a tragedy whichever
way she sought, but the tragedy had begun at the first breath of love
that had awakened her. So renouncing the future, she returned to the
thought of sacrifice,--to save Barabant and, appeasing the _manes_ of
Javogues, to dwell in her lover's heart a bright memory of youth and
devotion, that would abide with him through life. Therein she took her
courage and all her consolation.
With the arrival of Thermidor, the Terrorists, checked by the passive
attitude of the prisoners, introduced, as suspects among the prisons,
spies, who, succeeding by malignant imagination where brutality had
failed, denounced to the Committee of Safety a conspiracy by which
the prisoners were to escape by ropes from the windows, overpower the
guards, and assassinate the Convention.
The pretext was found sufficient and elastic, and the hecatombs
began. The spies, called _moutons_, prepared the lists each night
that sent troops of twenty-five or more each day into the fatal
chariots,--paralytics, men of seventy, feeble women and maidens,--the
crimes of all comprised under the heading of intention to assassinate
the Convention. As fast as the prisons were emptied the influx arrived,
forcing more transfers.
On the 7th of Thermidor, for the fifth time, Nicole and Barabant
were placed in the chariots, to be conveyed to another prison. Then
Barabant, utterly tired, rebelled and said:
"At last it is too much. I want to end it. I can endure it no longer.
Nicole, let me die now and be through with the suspense. We cannot
escape. They are guillotining fifty a day. Next month it will be a
hundred. Let us be firm and not await another month of torture."
"Then, Barabant, after all I have done," she said reproachfully, "you
would send me to the guillotine?"
"You?"
"I follow where you go."
But their companions cried in alarm: "What are you doing?"
"You'll betray us all!"
"For mercy's sake, be silent!"
Barabant, without energy to pursue long any determination, resigned
himself wearily to their protests and the appeal of Nicole.
The chariot rolled out into the streets, where the passers-by, weighted
down with the prevailing depression, regarded them without hatred
and without curiosity. Their journey led them by the gardens of the
Luxembourg, resplendent with green and the glisten of cool fountains.
In the chariot some one said:
"Pleasant weather!"
"What good does that do us?" grumbled another.
"I played there as a youngster; but what of that?"
"It does not seem different. How curious!"
"Where are we going?"
"To the Porte-Libre."
"I was there in Prairial."
"What's it like?"
"The same as the rest."
The whispered comments ceased as the prison loomed over them. The carts
ground on the cobblestones, passing the gate. From somewhere among them
a sigh was heard. A voice said, with a low laugh:
"Here's the inn. All down!"
They passed to the office for identification and enrolment, and on
through a square into the strange corridor to the hall, where a score
of inmates straggled in curiously to see if they recognized any of the
new arrivals. There, to her despair, Nicole beheld, in the shadow of a
pillar, screened a little from the crowd, the face she had dreaded for
months to encounter--the malignant face of Cramoisin, the Tapedure.
XII
THE FATHER OF LOUISON
The turbulent months which devastated the city with the fury of a pest
had been to Dossonville an exhilaration. Paths beset with a hundred
pitfalls he ran with enjoyment, passing from side to side with agility
and alacrity, reveling in intrigues, nourished by entanglements. But
the recrudescence of the Terror alarmed him in one way, for it rendered
him powerless to aid Barabant and Nicole. He still watched over them,
but even he dared not risk a communication, for the moment had arrived
when it sufficed no longer to be Jacobin or Moderate. To sleep securely
at home one must have been born lucky.
The death of Javogues and the disappearance of Cramoisin, Boudgoust,
and Jambony had left the domination of Dossonville undisputed.
Geneviève alone remained; but the girl, violently cast into womanhood
by the spark of love, had relapsed into childhood. He saw her once or
twice struggling under the weight of a bucket of water,--a child again
opening its uncomprehending eyes on the world.
Thus left to the liberty of his own pursuits, Dossonville had passed
the time running the streets, nose in the wind, smelling out the
popular favor, prying, laughing, never abandoning his equanimity,
furious and frantic when it was necessary, moderate and smooth of
speech when clemency was in the air.
So that the prudent, desiring no more than to agree with the strong,
had trimmed their sails by the conduct of Le Corbeau and Sans-Chagrin,
who reflected the mood of their inscrutable leader. In Nivôse, when a
wave of pity swept over the Convention, nothing could have been more
touching than the laments of Sans-Chagrin, while the glance of Le
Corbeau was benevolence itself. Their weapons disappeared, replaced by
boutonnières, while, lingering behind their leader, they jested with
all comers.
With the news of the wholesale drownings at Nantes and the revival of
massacres, the two had put forth cutlasses and pistols as a chestnut
blossoms overnight, and, stalking abroad with violent gestures and
furious speech, struck dismay in all who met their suspicious glances.
But the leader who, with a sign, worked these sudden transformations
was always at the head, imperturbable, alert, and impudent, twirling
as his only weapon the little ivory wand with which he whipped circles
in the air.
Occasionally he saw Louison, when the execution of a Mme. Du Barry or
a Maillard drew him to the spectacle of the guillotine. Between the
singular girl and himself there developed a curious attraction and
repulsion, which impelled or checked his interest as regularly as the
ebb and flow of the tides. When he saw her on the boulevards he felt
strongly her magnetism, but in the vicinity of the guillotine she
caused him a cold, almost repulsive, sensation.
So marked were her habits that a few had even bestowed on her the
soubriquet of "the daughter of the guillotine." At the Cabaret de
la Guillotine, where at lunch the menu bore the list of those to be
executed in the afternoon, she was pointed out as the one who had never
missed a performance. When discussions arose as to an execution, it was
always Louison who was appealed to to decide.
This development astounded Dossonville, then annoyed him, and finally
aroused him to such a pitch of disgust that one day he broke out: