MADNESS BECOMES FRENZY.
IN a moment the casks were broached, and the liquor, in whatever
receptacles were at hand, was passed around from mouth to eager mouth.
No one made the slightest attempt to husband it, and it was soon
pouring down over the steps in little purple rivulets. The faces of
the crowd, as the flaring torches and dancing flames revealed them,
became more and more inhuman, their shouts hoarser and more menacing,
their actions more and more bestial, until I felt my cheeks grow hot
at the thought that these creatures belonged to humankind. Truly long
centuries in the darkness had rendered them unfit for the light! If
vermin such as this was to govern France, then France would better far
be sunk in the ocean!
Drunken couples reeled hither and thither shouting incoherently; women
forgetting their sex pursued such men as made a pretense of escaping
and dragged them down into the shadows; a half-naked girl mounted
astride a cask shouted obscenities at six or eight scoundrels who were
going through the pretense of a mass.
“The Goddess of Reason!” said M. le Comte, his eyes dwelling upon this
group; and indeed at that moment, as the wretch who played the priest
made as though he were elevating the host, those behind him burst forth
in a hoarse shout:
“Long live Reason! Long live Reason!”
Sick with disgust I glanced at the heavens, wondering that God did not
blast them with his thunderbolts.
“I never thought such vileness could exist,” I murmured; and Pasdeloup,
who heard the words, smiled grimly.
“Do not blame them too bitterly, monsieur,” he said. “How does it
happen that they are what they are? What have they to thank God for?
Why should they be grateful to the church? All their lives they have
known only cruelty and injustice. Now it is their turn.”
“That is true,” I agreed; and suddenly I realized that this rude and
ignorant peasant had a broader and truer outlook upon life than I. And
I think that that moment saw the birth in me of a new tolerance and
sympathy. At least I hope it did!
No thunderbolt came. Perhaps God, too, was looking down more in pity
than in anger.
Attracted by the shout others of the crowd joined the group before the
steps, drank of the wine which the girl passed down to them, and began
a crazed Bacchanal dance before her. Then a red-faced rogue dashed up
the steps to her and screaming with laughter tore her few remaining
clothes from her back.
“Long live Reason!” he shouted. “I baptise thee!” and he dashed a cup
of wine over her glistening skin.
Another snatched a twig from a flowering shrub and bending it into the
semblance of a wreath placed it upon her head.
“Long live Reason!” he shouted in his turn. But a woman in the crowd,
jealous perhaps of the attentions shown the naked hussy, suddenly
caught up a clod of earth and dashed it into her face; whereupon the
goddess dismounted from her throne, vomiting forth I know not what
vileness, was caught up by the crowd and passed from sight.
Then one of their number mounted the steps and began to harangue them.
I could catch only a word here and there, yet it was easy enough to
guess, from the frantic shouts which interrupted him, what his subject
was. The mob was in a mood for any atrocity. It needed only the
application of the spark.
M. le Comte’s face grew grave as he gazed down at them.
“That is serious!” he said. “When they begin to speechify it is time to
think of escape. Have you anything to suggest, Tavernay?”
“If we could reach the ground on the side of the tower away from the
mob,” I said, “we might escape into the wood, since there seems to be
no watch of any kind, nor any one to intercept us.”
“Yes, but to reach the ground--we need a rope.”
“Is there none in the tower? Surely we can find something----”
“At least, we can look,” he said, and led the way to the stair.
I followed him, but Pasdeloup, his arms folded, his head sunk in
reverie, kept his place at the battlement, staring moodily down at the
drunken revel.
We descended to the floor below where Pasdeloup’s candle was still
burning. A glance at it showed me that it had been half consumed. An
hour more and we should be in darkness--if indeed we had not entered
the eternal darkness long ere that!
In the first moment I thought the room was empty; then I saw madame
half-sitting, half-lying on a couch in one corner, holding the younger
woman in her arms. As we approached she raised a warning finger to her
lips, and I saw with a sudden burst of tenderness that Charlotte had
fallen asleep.
“Do not disturb her,” warned madame in a low voice; but at that instant
the sleeper opened her eyes.
For a moment she stared up at us blankly; then her eyes met mine and a
wave of crimson swept from brow to chin.
“I have been asleep,” she said, sitting hastily erect. “In spite of all
my boasting,” she added, smiling up at me.
“Yes,” said M. le Comte; “and you should be proud of your steady nerves
and clear conscience, my dear. Not many of us are able to sleep so
peacefully in the face of danger.”
“Danger?” she repeated, and looked about her. “Has it come, then?”
“Oh, not a pressing danger,” he assured her. “Still, we must devise
some means of escape before it becomes so. We shall have to take the
light, I fear.”
“Do so,” said madame promptly. “Charlotte and I will ascend to the
platform.”
“It is not a pleasant sight that you will see,” said M. le Comte, “nor
pleasant words that you will hear----”
“We are not children,” broke in madame. “Come, Charlotte.”
M. le Comte lighted them up the stair and then turned back to me.
“It is evident there is no rope here,” he said, holding the candle
above his head and looking about the apartment. “The old furnishings
hang together better than one would think,” he added.
It was not until then--so occupied had my mind been with other
matters--that I perceived with what sumptuousness the place was
fitted up. The tapestries were faded and dusty, the coverings of the
furniture moth-eaten and decayed, and the room itself cobwebbed and
moldy--but it was impressive, nevertheless. It was of good size,
octagonal, conforming in shape to the tower, and in four of the sides
small, shuttered windows were set. Tapestries and furniture alike had
evidently been of the most costly and elegant description.
“This was the boudoir of the fair Gabrielle,” observed M. le Comte,
looking about him with a smile. “It has been years since I set foot
here and I had forgotten how it looked. You will see that with my
ancestor it was a real passion; he did not spare himself. In fact I
should hate to confess how much, first and last, she cost his family.
Below is her bedchamber.”
We went down the stair into another room even more luxuriously
furnished. The great bed stood at one side with curtains drawn. One
almost expected to see a small hand pluck them aside and to hear a
shrill voice demand the meaning of our intrusion, or to be suddenly
confronted by that old gallant Favras, oath on lip and sword in hand.
Here there were no windows, only narrow slits sufficient to admit air
and light but not wide enough to permit of assault from without. We
made a careful circuit of the apartment, but found nothing which could
by any possibility serve as a rope.
“There is one more chance,” said M. le Comte, and led the way to the
bottom story.
This had been divided into two rooms, one a sort of vestibule into
which the outer door opened and from which the stair ascended, and the
other a store-room. The vestibule was quite empty, and the store-room
contained nothing but a pile of rotting casks and broken bottles.
My companion looked at them with a whimsical countenance.
“The fair lady evidently did not lack refreshment,” he said. “I would
she had had the forethought to leave us a few bottles. I am afraid,” he
added, turning back to the vestibule, “that the only possible exit for
us is through that door. There are no windows in this story, nor in the
one above. To jump from the third story is to tempt death--or at least
a multitude of broken bones. For myself, I prefer to face the enemy.”
“We might make a rope from the tapestries,” I suggested.
“They are rotten with mildew,” he objected; and indeed when we tested
them we found them ready to fall to pieces at a touch. “Our situation
is not so desperate,” he continued, as we climbed slowly up the stair
again. “They will have to starve us out, since they have no cannon with
which to batter down the wall, and that will take two or three days at
the least. Many things may happen in that time.”
But though he spoke hopefully, I fancied his voice did not ring quite
true. When we reached the platform he blew out the candle, placed it
carefully in a crevice of the wall, then went to his wife where she
stood leaning against the parapet, put an arm about her and drew her to
him.
“Well?” she asked, smiling up at him.
“We are not yet out of the woods,” he said; “but, as I have just told
Tavernay, there is no pressing danger. They will have to besiege us in
form. Perhaps we may yet catch them napping.”
I had approached Mlle. de Chambray, drawn by an irresistible
attraction--which indeed I made no effort to resist.
“What is your opinion, M. de Tavernay?” she asked, as I leaned against
the wall beside her.
“I confess,” I answered gloomily, “that I see little hope of escape,
unless we can sprout wings and fly away. For you, mademoiselle, that
would not be so great a miracle; but I fear I am too far below the
angels to hope for such deliverance.”
“It is not the angels alone who have wings,” she retorted, her face
lighting with a smile. “I have heard of other spirits similarly
equipped.”
“It may be that I do not resemble them either, mademoiselle,” I
ventured mildly.
“Who can tell!” she retorted; and turned away from me to gaze at the
scene below.
The wine had done its work--had converted harmless peasants and
cowering wretches into bloodthirsty brutes animated by a kind of
frenzy which we for a moment did not understand. Men and women were
running about screaming madly, no longer heeding the fire which they
had kindled on the lawn, and which was now dying away for lack of
fuel. They were pouring in and out of the house with some other end in
view--and suddenly we saw what it was.
For from one wing of the château came a puff of smoke followed almost
instantly by a quick burst of flame.
“They have fired the house,” said M. le Comte grimly; and we stood
there numbly watching the progress of the flames, as powerless to check
them as though we had been a hundred leagues away.
They ate their way through the building with a rapidity which showed
how artfully they were being fed. Indeed it seemed to me that this
whole drama was moving forward to its climax with a regularity which
proved its prearrangement. It was not a spontaneous outburst of the
people; it was a thing theatric, carefully thought out, in which the
actors were really only puppets controlled by wires centring in one
powerful hand. And as I recalled Pasdeloup’s story there could be no
question in my mind as to whom that hand belonged. I shivered a little
as I asked myself what the crisis was toward which the drama was
mounting. And I felt strangely impotent, as though it were the very
hand of Fate raised against us, and not merely that of a vengeful and
lecherous scoundrel!
The flames burst out at last at roof and windows, casting a red glow
over lawn and garden, where the mob stood staring in half-awed triumph
at its handiwork. Madame watched the destruction with white face, but
with an admirable control.
“Can they fire the tower?” she asked.
“No, I think not,” answered her husband. “Fire from without would have
no effect upon these solid walls, and they cannot get fire to the
inside. The breeze, you see, is carrying those sparks away from us.”
“That was my home,” she murmured, “and I loved it.”
“We will build another,” said M. le Comte, pressing her to him. “When
this cloud that covers France has rolled away we will build another
home, which you will love even more, for we shall be very happy there.”
“Not happier than we have been here,” she said, with a smile full at
the same time of tears and joy. “We have been very happy here, my love.
Whatever they do, they cannot take the past away from us. The future
belongs to God, but the past is ours.”
I looked away from them with tear-dimmed eyes down at that mob of
savages. She had spoken truly--after all, their power for evil was
limited to that: they could destroy the future, but they could not
touch the past. And I remembered that I also had a past which was very
sweet--a past not long as men count time, spanning indeed but a few
short hours--and yet to memory an eternity!
“What are those men about?” asked a voice at my elbow, and Mlle. de
Chambray pointed down at a group which had drawn a little apart from
the rest.
They stood near the foot of the tower and seemed to be staring up at
us, though in the darkness I could not be certain. Suddenly one of them
whirled about his head some object which burst into a ring of flame.
Then he hurled it up toward us.
“The fools!” said M. le Comte, with a laugh, “what can they hope to
accomplish?”
As though in answer to the words there came from beneath our feet a
rending crash, a sharp report, and a stream of acrid smoke poured up
the stairway from the room below.