THE INQUIRY.
We can no longer leave in forgetfulness one of the principal personages
of this history, he who, during the accomplishment of the various
incidents of the preceding chapter had suffered most of all, and whose
anxieties merit the liveliest sympathy on the part of our readers.
The sun shone gloriously in the Rue de la Monnaie, and the gossips were
discoursing merrily at their doors, as if for the last ten months a
mist of blood had not hung over the city, when Maurice returned home,
bringing, as he had promised, the cabriolet with him. He gave the
bridle of the horse to a shoeblack, on the pavement of Saint Eustache,
and hastily ran upstairs, his heart filled with joy.
Love is a vivifying sentiment. It animates hearts long deadened to
every other sensation; it peoples the desert; it resuscitates before
the eyes the shade of the beloved one; it causes the voice which sings
in the soul of the lover to display before him the entire creation
illumined by the brilliant rays of hope and happiness,--at the same
time it is egotistical, blinding him who loves to all but the existence
of the beloved object.
Maurice neither saw these women nor listened to their commentaries; he
saw only Geneviève preparing for a departure which was at last to bring
them durable happiness; he heard only Geneviève singing carelessly her
customary song, and this little song trilled so sweetly in his ear
that he might have sworn he was listening to the varied modulations of
her voice, mingled with the less harmonious sound of closing locks.
Upon the landing Maurice stopped; the door was half open; it was
generally kept closed, and this circumstance surprised Maurice. He
looked all around, thinking Geneviève was in the corridor. She was not
there. He entered, looked in the antechamber, the dining-room, the
parlor, the bed-chamber; but anteroom, parlor, and bed-chamber were all
empty. He loudly called. No one replied.
The official, as he knew, had gone out. Maurice imagined that during
his absence Geneviève had perhaps required some cord to fasten her
trunk, or some refreshments to store in the carriage, and had gone out
to purchase them. He thought it imprudent; but although every moment
his anxiety increased, he as yet feared nothing serious.
Maurice waited for some time, walking up and down the room with long
impatient strides, and occasionally leaning out of the window, which,
half opened, admitted puffs of air charged heavily with rain.
But soon he believed that he heard a step upon the staircase; he
listened, it was not that of Geneviève; he ran to the landing, looked
over the palisade, and recognized the official, who leisurely mounted
the stairs after the manner of domestics.
"Scævola!" cried he.
The official raised his head.
"Ah! is it you, Citizen?"
"Yes. Where is the lady?"
"The lady?" demanded Scævola, with much surprise, as he continued
mounting the stairs.
"Certainly! Have you seen her below?"
"No."
"Go down, then, and ask the porter, and inquire of all the neighbors!"
Scævola descended.
"Quicker! quicker!" said his master; "do you not see I am burning with
impatience?"
After waiting five or six minutes, and Scævola not having made his
appearance, Maurice re-entered the apartment and again leaned out of
the window. He saw Scævola enter several shops, and leave them without
having gained any fresh intelligence. He called him. The official
raised his head, and saw his master impatiently looking from the
window. Maurice signed to him to come up.
"It is impossible that she has gone out," said Maurice to himself, and
again he called, "Geneviève! Geneviève!"
All was silent as death; even the solitary chamber appeared no longer
to have an echo. Scævola reappeared.
"Well?" demanded Maurice.
"The porter is the only person who has seen her."
"The porter has seen her; how was that?"
"He saw her go out."
"She has gone out, then?"
"It seems so."
"Alone! It is impossible Geneviève would go out alone."
"She was not alone, Citizen; she had a man with her."
"How! a man with her?"
"That is what the porter says, at least."
"Go and seek him. I must find out who this man was."
Scævola made a step toward the door, then, turning, "Wait," said he,
appearing to reflect.
"What is it?" said Maurice. "Speak, or you will be the death of me!"
"Perhaps it was the man who ran after me."
"What for?"
"To tell me that you wished the key."
"What key, stupid! will you not tell me?"
"The key of your apartment."
"You gave the key of the apartment to a stranger?" cried Maurice,
seizing the official by the collar with both hands.
"It was not to a stranger, sir; it was to one of your friends."
"Ah, yes! to one of my friends. It is Lorin, no doubt. She has gone out
with Lorin," and smiling a ghastly smile Maurice wiped away the drops
of agony which had gathered on his brow.
"No, sir; no, it was not he. Zounds! I think I should know Monsieur
Lorin."
"Who was it, then?"
"You know the man who came here one day?"
"What day?"
"The day when you were so sad; and he took you away with him, and you
returned so happy."
Scævola had remarked all these things.
Maurice regarded him with a bewildered air; a cold shudder ran through
his body. Then after a long silence:
"Dixmer!" cried he.
"By my faith! yes. I think it was he, Citizen."
Maurice tottered, and fell back upon a chair.
"Oh, my God!" murmured he.
When he re-opened his eyes they encountered the violets, forgotten, or
rather left there by Geneviève.
He rushed toward them, seized and kissed them; then, remarking where
she had placed them,--
"There is no longer any doubt," said he, "these violets--It is her last
adieu."
When Maurice turned round he perceived for the first time that the
trunk was half full, the rest of the linen was on the floor, or in the
half-opened wardrobe.
The linen which lay upon the floor had no doubt fallen from Geneviève's
hand at the appearance of Dixmer.
It was all explained now. The scene rose vivid and terrible before
his eyes, between these four walls that had lately witnessed so much
happiness.
Till now Maurice had remained crushed and heart-broken. Now the
reaction was fearful. His rage bordered on frenzy.
He rose, closed the window, took from the top of his desk a pair
of pistols, ready loaded for their intended journey, looked to the
priming, and finding all right placed them in his pocket.
He also furnished himself with two rolls of louis, which
notwithstanding his patriotism he had thought it prudent to conceal at
the bottom of a drawer, and taking his sabre in his hand,--
"Scævola," said he, "you are attached to me, I think; you have served
my father and myself for fifteen years."
"Yes, Citizen," replied the official, terrified at the pallor and
nervous trembling he had never before remarked in his master, who had
always been justly considered one of the most courageous and vigorous
of men,--"yes; what are your orders for me?"
"Listen! if this lady who lived here--" He stopped; his voice trembled
so much in pronouncing these words that he was unable to proceed. "If
she should return," continued he, after a moment's pause, "receive her,
close the door after her, take this gun, and station yourself upon
the staircase; and for your head, for your life, for your soul, do not
permit a single person to enter here! If any one should try to break
through the door, defend it! Strike! kill! kill! and fear nothing,
Scævola, for I will answer for all."
The young man's impetuous harangue, his vehement confidence,
electrified Scævola.
"I will not only kill, but will even suffer death for the Citizeness
Geneviève," said he.
"Thanks. Now attend! This apartment is odious to me, and I shall not
enter it again until I find her; if she has been able to effect her
escape, if she return, place before the window the Japan vase with the
china-asters, which she loved so much. That is, during the day. At
night, put a lantern. Every time I pass the end of the street I shall
know, and if I see neither vase nor lantern I shall still continue my
researches."
"Be prudent, sir! Oh, pray be prudent!" continued Scævola.
His master made no reply, but rushing from the chamber flew down the
staircase as if possessed of wings, and ran toward Lorin's house.
It would be difficult to paint the astonishment and rage of our worthy
poet when he heard the news; we might as well attempt to indite the
touching elegies with which Orestes inspired Pylades.
"And you do not know where she is?" he repeated, incessantly.
"Lost! disappeared!" shrieked Maurice, in accents of despair, "he has
killed her, Lorin! he has killed her!"
"No, my dear friend; no, Maurice; he has not killed her; it is not
after so many days of reflection that he would be likely to kill a
woman like Geneviève. If he had thought of doing so, he would have done
it on the spot, and have left her corpse there in token of his just
vengeance. No, no; he has taken her away, only too happy at having
regained his lost treasure."
"You do not know him, Lorin; you do not know him! This man had
something fatal in his look."
"You are mistaken," said Lorin; "he always struck me as a brave man. He
has taken her as a sacrifice. He will get himself arrested with her;
and they will die together. Ah, there is the danger!"
These words redoubled Maurice's fury.
"I will find her! I will find her, or perish in the attempt!" cried he.
"Oh, as to that, we are certain to find her," said Lorin; "only calm
yourself. They fail in success who do not reflect, and when agitated as
you are, we reflect badly and unwisely."
"Adieu, Lorin, adieu!"
"Where are you going, then?"
"I am going."
"You will leave me, then? Why is that?"
"Because this concerns me only. I alone should risk my life to save
Geneviève's."
"Do you wish to die?"
"I will face all. I will find out the president of the Committee of
Surveillance. I will speak to Hébert, to Danton, to Robespierre. I will
avow all; but she must be restored to me."
"Very well," said Lorin; and without adding another word he rose,
adjusted his belt, put on his military cap, and as Maurice had done,
provided himself with a pair of pistols, ready loaded, which he put in
his pocket.
"Let us go," said he, simply.
"But you will compromise yourself," said Maurice.
"Well! what of that?"
"Where shall we seek her first?" asked Maurice.
"We will first search in the old quarter, you know,--the old Rue Saint
Jacques; then we will watch for Maison-Rouge, as where he is, doubtless
Dixmer will be also; then we will draw near the houses in the Vieille
Corderie. You know they talk of transferring Marie Antoinette to the
Temple; believe me, men like them will not, till the last moment,
abandon the hope of saving her."
"Yes," repeated Maurice; "you are right--Maison-Rouge, do you think he
is in Paris?"
"Dixmer is certainly."
"It is true, it is true; of course they will be together!" said
Maurice, to whom these vague ideas seemed partially to restore reason.
The two friends commenced their search immediately, but all in vain.
Paris is large and well adapted for concealment. Never was a pit known
to conceal more obscurely the secret confided to its keeping by crime
or misery.
A hundred times Maurice and Lorin passed over the Place de Grève,
a hundred times passed the house that contained Geneviève, watched
incessantly by Dixmer, as the priests watch the victim destined for
sacrifice.
Geneviève on her side, seeing herself destined to perish, like all
generous souls accepted the sacrifice, and only wished to die quietly
and unnoticed; besides, she dreaded less for Dixmer than for the cause
of the queen the publicity that Maurice would not fail to give to his
vengeance.
She kept, then, a silence as profound as if death had already sealed
her lips.
In the mean time, without saying anything to Lorin, Maurice had applied
to the members of the terrible Committee of Public Safety; and Lorin,
without speaking to Maurice, had, on his part, determined to adopt
similar proceedings.
Thus on the same day a red cross was affixed by Fouquier Tinville to
both their names, and the word "Suspects" united them in a sanguinary
embrace.