Employing a very old-fashioned locution, the _citoyenne_ Gamelin had
declared: "that by dint of eating chestnuts they would be turning into
chestnuts." As a matter of fact, on that day, the 13th July, she and her
son had made their midday dinner on a basin of chestnut porridge. As
they were finishing this austere repast, a lady pushed open the door and
the room was flooded in an instant with the splendour of her presence
and the fragrance of her perfumes. Évariste recognised the _citoyenne_
Rochemaure. Thinking she had mistaken the door and meant her visit for
the _citoyen_ Brotteaux, her friend of other days, he was already
preparing to point her out the _ci-devant_ aristocrat's garret or
perhaps summon Brotteaux and so spare an elegant woman the task of
scrambling up a mill-ladder; but she made it clear at once that the
_citoyen_ Évariste Gamelin and no other was the person she had come to
see by announcing that she was happy to find him at home and was his
servant to command.
They were not entirely strangers to each other, having met more than
once in David's studio, in a box at the Assembly Hall, at the Jacobins,
at Venua's restaurant. On these occasions she had been struck by his
good looks and youth and interesting air.
Wearing a hat beribboned like a fairing and plumed like the head-piece
of a Representative on mission, the _citoyenne_ Rochemaure was wigged,
painted, patched and scented. But her complexion was young and fresh
behind all these disguises; these extravagant artificialities of fashion
only betokened a frantic haste to enjoy life and the feverishness of
these dreadful days when the morrow was so uncertain. Her corsage, with
wide facings and enormous basques and all ablaze with huge steel
buttons, was blood-red, and it was hard to tell, so aristocratic and so
revolutionary at one and the same time was her array, whether it was the
colours of the victims or of the headsman that she sported. A young
officer, a dragoon, accompanied her.
Dandling her long cane by its handle of mother-o'-pearl, a tall, fine
woman, of generous proportions and ample bosom, she made the circuit of
the studio, and putting up to her grey eyes her double quizzing-glasses
of gold, examined the painter's canvases with many smiles and
exclamations of delight, admiring the handsome artist and flattering him
in hopes of a return in kind.
"What," asked the _citoyenne_, "is that picture--it is so nobly
conceived, so touching--of a gentle, beautiful woman standing by a young
man lying sick?"
Gamelin told her it was meant to represent _Orestes tended by his sister
Electra_, and that, had he been able to finish it, it might perhaps have
been the least unsatisfactory of his works.
"The subject," he went on to say, "is taken from the _Orestes_ of
Euripides. I had read, in a translation of this tragedy made years ago,
a scene that filled me with admiration,--the one where the young
Electra, raising her brother on his bed of pain, wipes away the froth
that gathers on his lips, puts aside the locks that blind his eyes and
beseeches the brother she loves to hearken to what she will tell him
while the Furies are at peace for the moment.... As I read and re-read
this translation, I seemed to be aware of a kind of fog that shrouded
the forms of Greek perfection, a fog I could not drive away. I pictured
the original text to myself as more nervous and pitched in a different
accent. Feeling a keen desire to get a precise idea of the thing, I went
to Monsieur Gail, who was the Professor of Greek at the Collège de
France (this was in '91), and begged him to expound the scene to me word
by word. He did what I asked, and I then saw that the Ancients are much
more simple and homely than people think. Thus, for instance, Electra
says to Orestes: 'Dear brother, what joy it gave me to see thee sleep!
Shall I help thee to rise?' And Orestes answers: 'Yes, help me, take me
in thy arms, and wipe away the spume that still clings about my mouth
and eyes. Put thy bosom against mine and part from my brow my tangled
hair, for it blinds my eyes....' My mind still full of this poetry, so
young and vivid, ringing with these simple, strong phrases, I sketched
the picture you see there, _citoyenne_."
The painter, who, as a rule, spoke so sparingly of his works, waxed
eloquent on the subject of this one. At an encouraging gesture from the
_citoyenne_ Rochemaure, who lifted her quizzing-glasses in token of
attention, he continued:
"Hennequin has depicted the madness of Orestes in masterly fashion. But
Orestes appeals to us still more poignantly in his sorrow than when he
is distraught. What a fate was his! It was filial piety, obedience to a
sacred obligation, drove him to commit his dreadful deed,--a sin the
gods cannot but pardon, but which men will never condone. To avenge
outraged justice, he has repudiated Nature, has made himself a monster,
has torn out his own heart. But his spirit remains unbroken under the
weight of his horrible, yet innocent crime.... That is what I would fain
have exhibited in my group of brother and sister." He stepped up to the
canvas and looked at it not without satisfaction.
"Parts of the picture," he said, "are pretty nearly finished; the head
and arm of Orestes, for instance."
"It is an admirable composition.... And Orestes reminds me of you,
_citoyen_ Gamelin."
"You think he is like me?" exclaimed the painter, with a grave smile.
She took the chair Gamelin offered her. The young dragoon stood beside
her, his hand on the back of the chair on which she sat. Which showed
plainly that the Revolution was an accomplished fact, for under the
ancien régime, no man would ever, in company, have touched so much as
with the tip of a finger, the seat occupied by a lady. In those days a
gentleman was trained and broken in to the laws of politeness, sometimes
pretty hard laws, and taught to understand that a scrupulous
self-restraint in public places gives a peculiar zest to the sweet
familiarity of the boudoir, and that to lose your respectful awe of a
woman, you must first have that feeling.
Louise Masché de Rochemaure, daughter of a Lieutenant of the King's
Hunt, widow of a Procureur and, for twenty years, the faithful mistress
of the financier Brotteaux des Ilettes, had fallen in with the new
ideas. She was to be seen, in July, 1790, digging the soil of the Champ
de Mars. Her strong inclination to side with the powers that be had
carried her readily enough along a political path that started with the
Feuillants and led by way of the Girondins to end on the summit of _the
Mountain_, while at the same time a spirit of compromise, a passion for
conversion and a certain aptitude for intrigue still attached her to the
aristocratic and anti-revolutionary party. She was to be met
everywhere,--at coffee houses and theatres, fashionable restaurants,
gaming-saloons, drawing-rooms, newspaper offices and ante-chambers of
Committees. The Revolution yielded her a hundred satisfactions,--novelty
and amusement, smiles and pleasures, business ventures and profitable
speculations. Combining political with amorous intrigue, playing the
harp, drawing landscapes, singing ballads, dancing Greek dances, giving
supper parties, entertaining pretty women, such as the Comtesse de
Beaufort and the actress Mademoiselle Descoings, presiding all night
long over a _trente-et-un_ or _biribi_ table and an adept at _rouge et
noir_, she still found time to be charitable to her friends. Inquisitive
and interfering, giddy-pated and frivolous, she understood men but knew
nothing of the masses; as indifferent to the creed she professed as to
the opinions she felt bound to repudiate, understanding nothing whatever
of all that was happening in the country, she was enterprising,
intrepid, and full of audacity from sheer ignorance of danger and an
unbounded confidence in the efficacy of her charms.
The soldier who escorted her was in the heyday of youth. A brazen helmet
decorated with a panther skin and the crest set off with a crimson
cock's-comb shaded his fresh young face and displayed a long and
terrific mane that swept his back. His red jacket was cut short and
square, barely reaching to the waist, the better to show off his elegant
figure. In his girdle he carried an enormous sabre, the hilt of which
was a glittering eagle's beak. A pair of flapped breeches of sky blue
moulded the fine muscles of his legs and was braided in rich arabesques
of a darker blue on the thighs. He might have been a dancer dressed for
some warlike and dashing rôle, in _Achilles at Scyros_ or _Alexander's
Wedding-feast_, in a costume designed by a pupil of David with the one
idea of accentuating every line of the shape.
Gamelin had a vague recollection of having seen him before. He was, in
fact, the same young soldier he had come upon a fortnight previously
haranguing the people from the arcades of the Théâtre de la Nation.
The _citoyenne_ Rochemaure introduced him by name:
"The _citoyen_ Henry, Member of the Revolutionary Committee of the
Section of the Rights of Man."
She had him always at her heels,--a mirror of gallantry and a living and
walking guarantee of patriotism.
The _citoyenne_ complimented Gamelin on his talents and asked him if he
would be willing to design a card for a protégée of hers, a fashionable
milliner. He would, of course, choose an appropriate _motif_,--a woman
trying on a scarf before a cheval glass, for instance, or a young
workwoman carrying a band-box on her arm.
She had heard several artists mentioned as competent to execute a little
matter of the sort,--Fragonard _fils_, young Ducis, as well as a certain
Prudhomme; but she would rather apply to the _citoyen_ Évariste
Gamelin. However, she made no definite proposal on this head and it was
evident she had mentioned the commission merely by way of starting the
conversation. In truth she had come for something quite different. She
wanted the _citoyen_ Gamelin to do her a favour; knowing he was a friend
of the _citoyen_ Marat, she had come to ask him to introduce her to the
Friend of the People, with whom she desired an interview.
Gamelin replied that he was too insignificant an individual to present
her to Marat, besides which, she had no need of anyone to be her
sponsor; Marat, albeit overwhelmed with business, was not the
inaccessible person he was said to be,--and, added Gamelin:
"He will receive you, _citoyenne_, if you are in distress; his great
heart makes him compassionate to all who suffer. He will likewise
receive you if you have any revelation to make concerning the public
weal; he has vowed his days to the unmasking of traitors."
The _citoyenne_ Rochemaure answered that she would be happy to greet in
Marat an illustrious citizen, who had rendered great services to his
country, who was capable of rendering greater still, and that she was
anxious to bring the legislator in question into relation with friends
of hers of good repute and good will, philanthropists favoured by
fortune and competent to provide him with new means of satisfying his
ardent affection for humanity.
"It is very desirable," she concluded, "to make the rich co-operate in
securing public prosperity."
In actual fact, the _citoyenne_ had promised the banker Morhardt to
arrange a dinner where he and Marat should meet.
Morhardt, a Swiss like the Friend of the People, had entered into a
combination with several deputies of the Convention, Julien (of
Toulouse), Delaunay (of Angers) and the ex-Capuchin Chabot, to speculate
in the shares of the _Compagnie des Indes_. The game was very
simple,--to bring down the price of these shares to 650 livres by
proposing motions pointing in the direction of confiscation, in order to
buy up the greatest possible number at this figure and then push them up
to 4,000 or 5,000 livres by dint of proposals of a reassuring nature.
But for Chabot, Julien, Delaunay, their little ways were too notorious,
while suspicions were rife of Lacroix, Fabre d'Églantine, and even
Danton. The arch-speculator, the Baron de Batz, was looking for new
confederates in the Convention and had advised Morhardt to sound Marat.
This idea of the anti-revolutionary speculators was not so extravagant
as might have been supposed at the first blush. It was always the way of
these gentry to form alliance with those in power at the moment, and by
virtue of his popularity, his pen, his character, Marat was a power to
be reckoned with. The Girondists were near shipwreck; the Dantonists,
battered by the hurricane, had lost their hold on the helm. Robespierre,
the idol of the people, was a man jealous of his scrupulous honesty,
full of suspicion, impossible to approach. The great thing was to get
round Marat, to secure his good will against the day when he should be
dictator--and everything pointed to this consummation,--his popularity,
his ambition, his eagerness to recommend heroic measures. And it might
be, after all, Marat would re-establish order, the finances, the
prosperity of the country. More than once he had risen in revolt
against the zealots who were for outbidding him in fanaticism; for some
time past he had been denouncing the demagogues as vehemently as the
moderates. After inciting the people to sack the "cornerers'" shops and
hang them over their own counters, he was now exhorting the citizens to
be calm and prudent. He was growing into an administrator.
In spite of certain rumours disseminated against him as against all the
other chiefs of the Revolution, these pirates of the money-market did
not believe he could be corrupted, but they did know him to be vain and
credulous, and they hoped to win him over by flattery and still more by
a condescending friendliness which they looked upon as the most
seductive form of flattery from men like themselves. They counted,
thanks to him, on blowing hot and cold on all the securities they might
wish to buy and sell, and making him serve their interests while
supposing himself to be acting solely for the public good.
Great as a go-between, albeit she was still of an age for amours on her
own account, the _citoyenne_ Rochemaure had made it her mission to bring
together the legislator-journalist and the banker, and in her
extravagant imagination she already saw the man of the underworld, the
man whose hands were yet red with the blood of the September massacres,
a partner in the game of the financiers whose agent she was; she
pictured him drawn by his very warmth of feeling and unsophisticated
candour into the whirlpool of speculation, a recruit to the côterie she
loved of "corner" makers, contractors, foreign emissaries, gamblers, and
women of gallantry.
She insisted on the _citoyen_ Gamelin taking her to see the Friend of
the People, who lived quite near, in the Rue des Cordeliers, near the
church. After some little show of reluctance, the painter acceded to the
_citoyenne's_ wishes.
The dragoon Henry was invited to join them in the visit, but declined,
declaring he meant to keep his liberty of action, even towards the
_citoyen_ Marat, who, he felt no doubt, had rendered services to the
Republic, but was weakening nowadays; had he not, in his news sheet,
counselled resignation as the proper thing for the people of Paris?
And the young man, in a sweet voice, broken by long-drawn sighs,
deplored the fate of the Republic, betrayed by the men in whom she had
put her trust,--Danton rejecting the notion of a tax on the rich,
Robespierre opposing the permanence of the Sections, Marat, whose
pusillanimous counsels were paralyzing the enthusiasm of the citizens.
"Ah!" he cried, "how feeble such men appear beside Leclerc and Jacques
Roux!... Roux! Leclerc! _ye_ are the true friends of the people!"
Gamelin did not hear these remarks, which would have angered him; he had
gone into the next room to don his blue coat.
"You may well be proud of your son," observed the _citoyenne_
Rochemaure, addressing the _citoyenne_ Gamelin. "He is a great man;
talent and character both make him so."
In answer, the widow Gamelin gave a good account of her son, yet without
making much boast of him before a lady of high station, for she had been
taught in her childhood that the first duty of the lowly is humility
towards the great. She was of a complaining bent, having indeed only too
good cause and finding in such jeremiads a salve for her griefs. She was
garrulous in her revelations of all the hardships she had to bear to
any whom she supposed in a position to relieve them, and Madame de
Rochemaure seemed to belong to that class. She made the most, therefore,
of this favourable opportunity and told a long and breathless story of
their distresses,--how mother and son were both dying of slow
starvation. Pictures could not be sold any more; the Revolution had
killed business dead. Victuals were scarce and too dear for words....
The good dame poured out her lamentations with all the loose-lipped
volubility her halting tongue was capable of, so as to get them all
finished by the time her son, whose pride would not brook such whining,
should reappear. She was bent on attaining her object in the shortest
possible time,--that of touching a lady whom she deemed rich and
influential, and enlisting her sympathy in her boy's future. She felt
sure that Évariste's good looks were an asset on her side to move the
heart of a well-born lady. And so they were; the _citoyenne_ Rochemaure
proved tender-hearted and was melted to think of Évariste's and his
mother's sufferings. She made plans to alleviate them; she had rich men
amongst her friends and would get them to buy the artist's pictures.
"The truth is," she added, with a smile, "there is still money in
France, but it keeps in hiding."
Better still, now Art was ruined, she would obtain Évariste a post in
Morhardt's bank or with the Brothers Perregaux, or a place as clerk in
the office of an army contractor.
Then she reflected that this was not what a man of his character needed;
and, after a moment's thought, she nodded in sign that she had hit the
nail on the head:
"There are still several jurymen left to be appointed on the
Revolutionary Tribunal. Juryman, magistrate, that is the thing to suit
your son. I have friendly relations with the Committee of Public Safety.
I know Robespierre the elder personally; his brother frequently sups at
my house. I will speak to them. I will get a word said to Montané,
Dumas, Fouquier."
The _citoyenne_ Gamelin, bursting with excitement and gratitude, put a
finger to her lip; Évariste was coming back into the studio.
He escorted the _citoyenne_ Rochemaure down the gloomy staircase, the
steps of which, whether of wood or tiled, were coated with an ancient
layer of dirt.
On the Pont-Neuf, where the sun, now near its setting, threw a
lengthened shadow from the pedestal that had borne the Bronze Horse and
was now gay with the National colours, a crowd of men and women of the
people gathered in little groups were listening to some tale that was
being told them. Consternation reigned and a heavy silence, broken at
intervals by groans and fierce cries. Many were making off at a rapid
pace in the direction of the Rue de Thionville, erstwhile Rue Dauphine;
Gamelin joined one of these groups and heard the news--that Marat had
just been assassinated.
Little by little the tidings were confirmed and particulars became
known; he had been murdered in his bath by a woman who had come
expressly from Caen to commit the crime.
Some thought she had escaped; but the majority declared she had been
arrested.
There they stood like sheep without a shepherd, thinking sadly:
"Marat, the tender-hearted, the humane, Marat our benefactor, is no
longer there to guide us, Marat who was never deceived, who saw through
every subterfuge and never feared to reveal the truth!... What can we
do, what is to become of us? We have lost our adviser, our champion, our
friend." They knew very well whence the blow had come, and who had
directed the woman's arm. They groaned aloud:
"Marat has been struck down by the same criminal hands that are bent on
our extermination. His death is the signal for the slaughter of all good
patriots."
Different reports were current, as to the circumstances of the tragic
event and the last words of the victim; endless questions were asked
concerning the assassin, all that anyone knew was that it was a young
woman sent by those traitors, the federalists. Baring teeth and nails,
the _citoyennes_ devoted the culprit to condign punishment; deeming the
guillotine too merciful a death, they demanded this monster of iniquity
should be scourged, broken on the wheel, torn limb from limb, and racked
their brains to invent new tortures.
An armed body of National Guards was haling to the Section headquarters
a man of determined mien. His clothes were in tatters, and streams of
blood trickled down his white face. He had been overheard saying that
Marat had earned his fate by his constant incitements to pillage and
massacre, and it was only with great difficulty that the Guards had
saved him from the fury of the populace. A hundred fingers pointed him
out as the accomplice of the assassin, and threats of death followed him
as he was led away.
Gamelin was stunned by the blow. A few hot tears blistered his burning
eyes. With the grief he felt as a disciple mingled solicitude for the
popular idol, and these combined feelings tore at his heart-strings. He
thought to himself:
"After Le Peltier, after Bourdon, Marat!... I foresee the fate of the
patriots; massacred on the Champ de Mars, at Nancy, at Paris, they will
perish one and all." And he thought of Wimpfen, the traitor, who only a
while before was marching on Paris, and who, had he not been stopped at
Vernon, by the gallant patriots, would have devoted the heroic city to
fire and slaughter.
And how many perils still remained, how many criminal designs, how many
treasonable plots, which only Marat's perspicacity and vigilance could
unravel and foil! Now he was dead, who was there to denounce Custine
loitering in idleness in the Camp of Cæsar and refusing to relieve
Valenciennes, Biron tarrying inactive in the Lower Vendée letting Saumur
be taken and Nantes blockaded, Dillon betraying the Fatherland in the
Argonne?...
Meantime, all about him, rose momentarily higher the sinister cry:
"Marat is dead; the aristocrats have killed him!"
As he was on his way, his heart bursting with grief and hate and love,
to pay a last mark of respect to the martyr of liberty, an old
countrywoman, wearing the coif of the Limousin peasantry, accosted him
to ask if the Monsieur Marat who had been murdered was not Monsieur le
Curé Mara, of Saint-Pierre-de-Queyroix.