And giving her his hand to lead her to the door, this time he avoided

letting her step upon the beautiful map, upon which her foot, light as

it was, had left its trace.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE SIBYL

As she had told the young general, Madame de Beauharnais found Madame

Tallien waiting for her.

Madame Tallien (Thérèse Cabarus) was, as everybody knows, the daughter

of a Spanish banker. She was married to M. Davis de Fontenay, a

councillor of the parliament of Bordeaux, but was soon divorced from

him. This was at the beginning of '94, when the Terror was at its

height.

Thérèse Cabarus wished to rejoin her father, who was in Spain, in order

to escape the evils of which proscription was the least. Arrested at the

gates of the city, she was brought before Tallien, who fell passionately

in love with her at first sight. She made use of this passion to save a

great number of victims. At this time love was the most powerful

opponent of its rival, death.

Tallien was recalled, and Thérèse Cabarus followed him to Paris, where

she was arrested; from the depths of her prison she brought about the

9th Thermidor, after which she was free.

It will be remembered that her first care had been to secure the liberty

of her companion in prison, Josephine de Beauharnais.

From that time the two women had been inseparable. One woman only in

Paris disputed the palm of beauty with them; and that woman was Madame

Récamier.

This evening, as we know, they had decided to go to the fashionable

sibyl, Mademoiselle Lenormand, disguised as maids, and under assumed

names. In a twinkling the two great ladies were transformed into two

charming grisettes.

Their lace caps fell over their eyes, and the hood of a little silk

mantle hid the head; clad in short dresses of India muslin, and bravely

shod with shoes with paste buckles and stockings embroidered with pink

and green, which their skirts did not hide, they jumped into a hired

carriage, which they had ordered to stop at the great gate of the house

No. 11, Rue Neuve-des-Mathurins. Then, in a trembling voice, like that

of all women who are doing something out of the ordinary, Madame de

Beauharnais said to the driver: "Rue du Tournon, No. 7."

The carriage stopped at the place indicated, the driver got down from

his seat, opened the door, received his fare, and knocked at the

house-door, which was opened at once.

The two women hesitated an instant, as if their hearts failed them at

the critical moment. But Madame Tallien urged her friend on. Josephine,

light as a bird, alighted upon the pavement without touching the step;

Madame Tallien followed her. They crossed the formidable threshold, and

the door closed behind them.

They found themselves under a sort of porte-cochère, the arch of which

extended into the court. At the further end, by the light of a

reflector, they saw these words written on an outside shutter:

"Mademoiselle Lenormand, bookseller."

They advanced toward this light, which revealed a short flight of four

steps. They went up the four steps and came to a porter's lodge.

"Citizeness Lenormand?" inquired Madame Tallien, who, although the

younger of the two, seemed on this occasion to take the initiative.

"Ground floor, left-hand door," replied the porter.

Madame Tallien went up the steps first, holding up her already short

skirt, which discovered a leg that might vie with a Greek statue in

shape, which had, nevertheless, condescended this evening to the

grisette's garter tied below the knee. Madame de Beauharnais followed,

admiring her friend's free and easy manner, but unable to emulate it.

She was still only half-way up the steps when Madame Tallien rang the

bell. An old servant opened the door.

The new arrivals, whose faces were more of a recommendation than their

attire, were examined with the most scrupulous minuteness by the lackey,

who bade them sit down in a corner of the first room. The second, which

was a salon, and through which the lackey had to pass to reach his

mistress, was occupied by two or three women whose rank it would have

been difficult to determine, all ranks at that time being practically

merged into that of the bourgeois. But to their great astonishment, the

door of the second salon opened after a few moments, and Mademoiselle

Lenormand herself came and spoke to them, saying:

"Ladies, be good enough to enter the salon."

The two pretended grisettes looked at each other in astonishment.

Mademoiselle Lenormand was supposed to make her predictions in a state

of somnambulism. Was this true, and had she, by reason of her

second-sight, recognized, even without seeing them, two ladies of rank

in the supposed grisettes whom the lackey had announced?

At the same time, Mademoiselle Lenormand signed to the ladies in the

first salon to pass into the second room, where she told fortunes.

Madame Tallien and Madame de Beauharnais began to examine the room in

which they had been left. Its principal ornaments were two portraits,

one of Louis XVI. and the other of Marie-Antoinette. Notwithstanding the

terrible days that had passed, and the fact that the heads of the

originals had fallen upon the scaffold, the portraits had not left their

places, and had not for an instant ceased to be treated with the

respect which Mademoiselle Lenormand entertained for the originals.

After the portraits, the most remarkable thing in the room was a long

table covered with a cloth, upon which sparkled necklaces, rings, and

pieces of silverware elegantly wrought; most of the last dating from the

eighteenth century. All of these trinkets had been given to the sibyl by

persons to whom she had doubtless made agreeable predictions which had

been fulfilled.

The door of the cabinet opened shortly, and the last person who had

arrived before the two ladies was called. The friends remained alone.

A quarter of an hour passed, during which they conversed in subdued

tones, then the door opened again, and Mademoiselle Lenormand came out.

"Which of you ladies wishes to come in first?" she asked.

"Can we not go in together?" asked Madame de Beauharnais quickly.

"Impossible, madame," replied the sibyl; "I have sworn never to read the

cards for one person in the presence of another."

"May we know why?" asked Madame Tallien, with her customary vivacity,

and we may almost say her usual indiscretion.

"Because in a portrait which I had the misfortune to draw too near to

life one of two ladies whom I was receiving recognized her husband."

"Go in, Thérèse; go in," said Madame de Beauharnais, urging her friend.

"So I am always to be the one to sacrifice myself," said the latter. And

then, smiling at her friend, she said: "Well, so be it; I will risk it."

And she entered.

Mademoiselle Lenormand was at that time a woman of from twenty-four to

twenty-nine years of age, short and stout in figure, and vainly

endeavoring to disguise the fact that one shoulder was higher than the

other; she wore a turban adorned with a bird of paradise. Her hair fell

in long curls around her face. She wore two skirts, one over the other;

one was short, scarcely falling to the knees, and pearl-gray in color;

the other was longer, falling in a short train behind her, and was

cherry-red.

Beside her on a cushion lay her favorite greyhound, named Aza.

The table upon which she made her calculations was nothing but a common

round table covered with a green baize cloth, with drawers in front, in

which the sibyl stowed her various apparatus. The cabinet was as long as

the salon, but narrower. An oak bookcase ran along the wall on each side

of the door, filled with books. Facing her seat was an armchair for the

person who was consulting her.

Between her and the subject lay a steel rod, which was called the

divining-rod. The end, pointing toward the client, was tipped with a

little coiled steel serpent; the other end resembled a riding-whip.

This was what Madame de Beauharnais saw during the brief moment that the

door was open to admit her friend.

Josephine took up a book, drew near to the lamp, and tried to read; but

her attention was soon diverted by the sound of a bell and the entrance

of another person.

It was a young man dressed in the height of the fashion adopted by the

incroyables. Between his hair, which fell to a level with his eyebrows,

his dog's-ears falling over his shoulders, and his neckcloth, which

reached to his cheekbones, one could scarcely distinguish a straight

nose, a firm and resolute mouth, and eyes as brilliant as black

diamonds.

He bowed without speaking, twirled his gnarled stick three or four times

around his head, hummed three false notes, as if he were just finishing

a tune, and sat down in a corner.

But although this griffin's eye, as Dante would have said, was hardly

visible in the corner, Madame de Beauharnais was beginning to feel

uncomfortable under its stare, although the incroyable was seated at

one end of the salon and she at the other. But just then Madame Tallien

came out.

"Ah! my dear," she said, going straight to her friend, without seeing

the incroyable, who sat in the shadow--"ah! my dear, go in quickly.

Mademoiselle Lenormand is charming; just guess what she has predicted

for me?"

"Why, my dear," replied Madame Beauharnais, "that you will be loved,

that you will be beautiful until you are fifty years of age, and that

you will have love-affairs all your life--"

And as Madame Tallien made a movement as if to say, "No, not that," she

continued: "And that you will have a tall footman, a fine house,

beautiful carriages, and white or bay horses."

"I shall have all that, my dear; and, furthermore, if our sibyl is to be

believed, I shall be a princess."

"I congratulate you sincerely, my beautiful princess," said Josephine;

"but as I do not see that there is anything left for me to ask for, and

as I shall probably never be a princess, and my pride already suffers at

being less beautiful than you, I will not give it further cause for

envy, which might make us quarrel."

"Are you in earnest, dear Josephine?"

"No; but I will not expose myself to the inferiority which threatens me

on all sides. I leave you your principality; let us run away."

She made a movement as if to go away, and to take Madame Tallien with

her; but just then a hand was placed lightly on her arm, and a voice

said: "Remain, madame, and perhaps when you have heard me, you will find

that you have nothing to envy your friend."

Josephine greatly desired to know what was in store for her that would

exalt her so that she would have no need to envy a princess. She

therefore yielded, and entered Mademoiselle Lenormand's cabinet in her

turn.

CHAPTER XXIX

FORTUNE-TELLING

Mademoiselle Lenormand motioned to Josephine to seat herself in the

chair which Madame Tallien had just vacated, and then she drew a fresh

pack of cards from a drawer--probably that the destinies of one should

not influence the other. Then she looked fixedly at Madame de

Beauharnais.

"You sought to deceive me," she said, "by coming to consult me in vulgar

attire. I am a clairvoyant, and I saw you leave a house in the centre of

Paris; I saw you finally in the anteroom when your place was in the

salon, and I came to look for you. Do not seek to deceive me; answer my

questions frankly, and since you have come in search of truth, tell the

truth."

Madame de Beauharnais bowed.

"If you care to question me I am ready to reply."

"What animal do you like best?"

"The dog."

"What flower do you prefer?"

"The rose."

"What perfume pleases you the best?"

"That of the violet."

The sibyl placed before Madame de Beauharnais a pack of cards almost

double the size of ordinary ones. These had not been invented more than

a month, and were called the "great oracle."

"Let us see first where you are placed," said the sibyl.

And, turning over the pack, she separated the cards with the wand and

found the consulting client; that is to say, a brunette in a white dress

with a broad, embroidered flounce, and a cloak of red velvet with a long

flowing train. She was placed between the eight of hearts and the ten of

clubs.

"Chance has placed you well, as you see, madame. The eight of hearts has

three different meanings in as many different rows. The first, which is

the eight of hearts itself, represents the conjunction of the stars

under which you were born. The second, an eagle carrying away a toad

from a pond, over which he is hovering. The third, a female near a tomb.

This is what I see, madame, in the first card. You were born under the

influence of Venus and the moon. You have recently had a very

satisfactory experience, almost in the nature of a triumph. Finally,

this woman dressed in black near a tomb indicates that you are a widow.

On the other hand, the ten of clubs promises success in an undertaking

which has just begun, and of which you are scarcely cognizant. It would

be impossible to find a more fortunate throw of cards."

Then, taking up the pack and shuffling them, Mademoiselle Lenormand

asked Madame de Beauharnais to cut them with her left hand, and to draw

fourteen cards, which she was to place in any order she chose beside the

brunette, from right to left, as Orientals write.

Madame de Beauharnais obeyed, and cut and arranged the cards as

requested.

Mademoiselle Lenormand followed them with her eyes, more attentively

than Madame de Beauharnais, as the latter turned them.

"In truth, madame, you are fortunate," said she; "and I am convinced

that you did well not to be frightened by the prediction which I made to

your friend, brilliant though it was. Your first card is the five of

diamonds; beside it I find the beautiful constellation of the Southern

Cross, which is invisible to us here in Europe. The main subject of the

card, a Greek or Mohammedan traveller, indicates that you were born

either in the East or the colonies. The parrot, or the orange tree,

which forms the third subject, makes me incline to the colonies. The

flower, which is a veratrum, very common in Martinique, would almost

justify me in saying that you were born in that island."

"You are not mistaken, madame."

"Your third card, the nine of diamonds, makes me think that you left the

island when still very young. The convolvulus, which figures on the

lower part of the card, and which is the symbol of a woman seeking for

something to cling to, would indicate that you left the island to be

married."

"That is also true, madame," said Josephine.

"Your fourth card, which is the ten of spades, indicates the loss of

your hopes; but the fruits and flowers of the saxifrage which are on the

same card suggest that the disappointment was but momentary, and that a

happy conclusion--probably a marriage--succeeded fears which amounted

even to loss of hope."

"If you had read in the book of my own life, madame, you could not have

seen more clearly."

"That encourages me," said the sibyl; "for I see such strange things in

your cards that I should stop short if your denial were added to my own

doubts."

"Here is the eight of spades. Achilles is dragging Hector, chained to

his car, around the walls of Troy; lower down a woman is kneeling before

a tomb. Your husband, like the Trojan hero, must have died a violent

death, probably upon the scaffold. But here is a singular thing, on the

same card: opposite the weeping woman the bones of Pelops are crossed

above the talisman of the moon, which means, 'Happy fatality.' To a

great misfortune will succeed good fortune which is even greater."

Josephine smiled.

"That belongs to the future and therefore I cannot answer for it."

"You have two children?" asked the sibyl.

"Yes, madame."

"A son and a daughter?"

"Yes."

"See here on the same card, the ten of diamonds, your son takes a

resolution without consulting you, which is of the greatest importance,

not in itself, but in its results.

"On the bottom of this card is one of the talking oaks of the forest of

Dodona, as you see; Jason is lying in its shade and listening. What does

he hear? The voice of the future which your son heard when he decided

upon that step which he has just taken.

"The card which follows, the knave of diamonds, shows you Achilles

disguised as a woman at the court of Lycomenes. The glitter of a sword

will make a man of him. Is there something about a sword that has

occurred between your son and some other person?"

"Yes, madame."

"Well, here at the bottom of the card is Juno, crying: 'Courage, young

man, help will not be wanting!' I am not sure, but in this card, which

is nothing less than that of a king of diamonds--but I think I see your

son addressing a powerful soldier, and obtaining of him what he wants.

"The four of diamonds shows you yourself, madame, at the moment when

your son is telling you of the fortunate result of his attempt. The

flowers growing at the bottom of this card admonish you not to let

yourself be overcome by difficulties, and that you will thereby reach

the goal of your desires. And finally, madame, here is the eight of

clubs, which positively indicates a marriage; placed as it is, next to

the eight of hearts, which is the eagle soaring aloft with the toad in

his talons, it indicates that this marriage will exalt you above the

most eminent ranks of society.

"Then, if we still doubt, here is the six of hearts, which unfortunately

is so rarely seen with the eight. Here is the eight and upon it the

alchemist watching the transformation of the stone into gold; that is to

say the ordinary life changing into one of nobility, honors, and a lofty

position. See among these flower a convolvulus, twining itself around a

lily shorn of its blossoms; that means, madame, that you will succeed;

that you, who are simply seeking a support, will succeed--how shall I

tell you?--to everything that is grandest and most powerful in France,

in short to the lily shorn of its blossoms; and, as indicated by the

ten of clubs, that you will succeed to all this by passing across

battlefields, where, as you see, Ulysses and Diomedes are carrying off

the white horse of Rheseus, placed under the care of the talisman of

Mars.

"There, madame, you will enjoy the respect and affection of the whole

world. You will be the wife of this Hercules stifling the lion of the

Nemean forest; that is to say the useful and courageous man who exposes

himself to every danger for the good of his country. The flowers with

which you are crowned are the lilac, the arum, and the immortelle, for

you will represent true merit and perfect goodness."

Then, rising enthusiastically and seizing Madame de Beauharnais's hand

as she fell at her feet, she said: "Madame, I know neither your name nor

your rank, but I can read your future. Madame, remember me when you

are--empress!"

"Empress? I? You are mad, my dear woman."

"What, madame, do you not see that your last card, the one to which the

other fourteen lead, is the king of hearts, the great Charlemagne, who

holds his sword in one hand and the globe in the other? Do you not see

upon the same card the man of genius, who, with a book in his hand and a

sphere at his feet, meditates upon the destinies of the world? And, last

of all, do you not see on the two desks, placed opposite each other, the

Book of Wisdom and the laws of Solon, which proves that your husband

will be a legislator as well as a conqueror."

Improbable as was the prediction, the blood rushed to Josephine's head.

Her eyes grew dim, her forehead was bathed with perspiration, and a

shiver ran through her whole body.

"Impossible! impossible! impossible!" she murmured, and she sank back in

her chair.

Then suddenly remembering that this consultation had lasted nearly an

hour, and that Madame Tallien was waiting for her, she rose, tossed her

purse to Mademoiselle Lenormand without looking to see how much it

contained, and darted into the salon. She seized Madame Tallien by the

waist and drew her away, scarcely replying to the bow which the

incroyable made to the two ladies as they passed before him.

"Well?" asked Madame Tallien, stopping Josephine on the flight of steps

which led down to the courtyard.

"Well," replied Madame de Beauharnais, "that woman is crazy."

"What did she predict for you?"

"It is your turn first."

"I warn you, my dear, that I have already become accustomed to her

prediction," said Madame Tallien; "she said that I would be a princess."

"Well," said Josephine, "I am not yet accustomed to mine. She said that

I would be an empress."

And the two false grisettes got into their carriage.

CHAPTER XXX

THE PRETENDED INCROYABLE

As we have said, the two ladies, excited over their predictions, had

scarcely paid any attention to the young man who was waiting his turn.

During the long session that Madame de Beauharnais had with the sibyl,

Madame Tallien had tried more than once to discover to what class of

incroyable the young man in question belonged. But he, evidently little

inclined to respond to her attempts at conversation, had drawn his hair

over his eyes, his cravat over his chin, and his dog's-ears over his

cheeks, and had settled down in his chair with a sort of grunt, like a

man who would not be sorry to shorten the time of waiting by a short

nap.

Madame de Beauharnais's long sitting had passed thus: Madame Tallien

pretending to read, and the incroyable pretending to sleep.

But as soon as the ladies had gone out, and he had followed them with

his eyes until they had disappeared, he presented himself in turn at the

door of Mademoiselle Lenormand's cabinet. The appearance of this new

client was so grotesque that it brought a smile to her lips.

"Mademoiselle," he said, affecting the ridiculous speech of the young

dandies of the day, "will you have the goodness to tell me the fortunate

or unfortunate vicissitudes which destiny has reserved for the person of

your humble servant. Nor will he conceal from you that that person is so

dear to him that he will learn with gratitude whatever agreeable

presages you may impart to him. He must add, however, that owing to his

great self-control, he will listen with equanimity to whatever

catastrophes with which you may be pleased to threaten him."

Mademoiselle Lenormand looked at him anxiously for a moment. Did his

indifference amount to madness, or was she dealing with one of those

young men of the day who took pleasure in mocking the holiest things,

and who would, therefore, have no scruple about insulting the sibyl of

the Rue Tournon, firmly established though she was in the good opinion

of the inhabitants of the Faubourg Saint-Germain.

"Do you wish me to cast your horoscope?" she asked.

"Yes, my horoscope--a horoscope like that which was cast at the birth of

Alexander, son of Philip of Macedon. Without expecting to attain to the

renown of the conqueror of Porus, and the founder of Alexandria, I

intend some day to make a stir in the world. Have the goodness therefore

to prepare whatever may be necessary, and to predict the best of good

fortune for me."

"Citizen," said Mademoiselle Lenormand, "I employ different methods."

"Let us hear what they are," said the incroyable, thrusting his stomach

forward, and slipping his thumbs into the armholes of his waistcoat and

letting his cane dangle from the cord around his wrist.

"For example, I prophesy by the whites of eggs, the analysis of coffee

grounds, spotted or algebraic cards, and I sometimes read the future by

means of a cock."

"The last would suit me very well," said the young man. "But we should

need a living cock, and a glassful of wheat; have you got them?"

"I have them," replied Mademoiselle Lenormand. "I also use catoptromancy

at times."

"I am looking for a Venetian mirror; for, as nearly as I can remember,"

said the young man, "catoptromancy is performed with a Venetian mirror

and a drop of water spilled upon it."

"Exactly, citizen. You seem to be well informed concerning my art."

"Bah!" said the young man. "Yes, yes; I take an occasional turn at the

occult sciences."

"There is also chiromancy," observed Mademoiselle Lenormand.

"Ah! that is what I want. All the other practices are more or less

diabolical, while chiromancy has never been censured by the Catholic

Church, being a science founded upon principles drawn from Holy Writ and

transcendental philosophy. As much cannot be said for hydromancy, you

will concede, citizeness, which has to do with a ring thrown into water;

nor of pyromancy, which consists of placing the victim in the midst of a

fire; of geomancy, which is performed by tracing cabalistic signs upon

the ground; of capnomancy, where poppy seeds are thrown on burning

coals; of coscinomancy, in which the hatchet, the sieve and the tongs

are employed; nor, finally, of anthropomancy, in which human victims are

sacrificed."

Mademoiselle watched her interlocutor with a certain uneasiness. Was he

speaking seriously? Was he making fun of her? Or did he conceal beneath

his assumed indifference a desire to remain unrecognized?

"Then you prefer chiromancy?" she asked.

"Yes," replied the incroyable; "for with chiromancy, were you the devil

himself, or his wife Proserpine," and he bowed gallantly to Mademoiselle

Lenormand, "I should not fear for the safety of my soul, since the

patriarch Job has said (verse 7, chapter xxxvii.), 'God hath drawn lines

in the hands of men in order that each may know his destiny.' And

Solomon, the pre-eminently wise king, added: 'Length of life is marked

in the right hand, and the lines of the left hand betoken wisdom and

glory.' Finally we read in the prophet Isaiah, 'Your hand denotes that

you will live a long time.' Here is mine, what does it say?"

As he spoke, the young incroyable took off his glove and extended a hand

that was delicate and well-shaped, although thin and tanned by the sun.

Its proportions were perfect, the fingers long and smooth; and he wore

no rings.

Mademoiselle Lenormand took it and examined it carefully. Then her eyes

turned from the young man's hand to his face.

"Sir," said she, "it must have cost your natural dignity much to clothe

yourself as you have, and in so doing, you must have yielded, either to

a great curiosity, or to the first expression of an unconquerable

feeling. You are wearing a disguise and not your accustomed attire. Your

hand is that of a soldier accustomed to wield the sword rather than to

twirl the cane of an incroyable, or the switch of a dandy. Neither is

this language you now affect natural to you. You know all of these

sciences which you have mentioned, but you have learned them while

studying others which you deemed more important. You have a taste for

occult researches, but your future is not that of a Nicolas Flamel or a

Cagliostro. You have asked in jest for a horoscope similar to the one

which was cast at the birth of Alexander, son of Philip of Macedon. It

is too late to cast the horoscope of your birth, but I can tell you what

has happened to you since your birth, and what the future holds in store

for you."

"Faith, you are right," said the young man in his natural voice, "and I

confess that I am ill at ease in this disguise; neither, as you have

said, am I accustomed to this language which I have just now used. Had

you been deceived by my language and my attire, I should have said

nothing, and would have left you with a shrug of the shoulders. The

discovery which you have made in spite of my efforts to deceive you,

proves to me that there is something in your art. I well know that it is

tempting God," he added gloomily, "to seek to wrest from him the secrets

of the future; but where is the man who feels within himself the power

to achieve great things, who would not wish to aid, by a knowledge of

the future, the events which life holds in store for him? You say that

you will tell me of my past life. I ask but a few words on that score,

being anxious rather to know the future. I repeat, here is my hand."

Mademoiselle Lenormand's eyes rested for a moment on the palm of his

hand, then, raising her head, she said:

"You were born on an island, of a family which, though noble, has

neither wealth nor renown. You left your country to be educated in

France, you entered the service in a special branch, the artillery. You

have gained a great victory, which was of immense use to your country,

but for which you were poorly recompensed. For a time you thought of

leaving France. Fortunately obstacles multiplied and you remained. You

have just forced yourself into notoriety by a brilliant stroke which has

assured you the support of the future Directory. This very day--and mark

well the date--though it has been signalled by the most ordinary events

alone, will become one of the most important landmarks of your life. Do

you believe in my art now, and shall I continue?"

"Certainly," replied the pretended incroyable, "and that you may have

every facility in your work, I will begin by showing you my real

features."

At these words he took off his hat, threw aside his wig, untied his

cravat, and revealed that head of bronze, of which it has been said that

it seemed to have been modelled from an antique medal. He frowned

slightly, brushed his hair from his temples with his hand, and his eye

grew stern, resolute, almost haughty, as did his voice; and he said, no

longer with the lisp of the incroyable, or the gentleness of a man

addressing a woman, but with the firmness of a command, as he presented

his hand to the sibyl for the third time: "Look!"

CHAPTER XXXI

"MACBETH, THOU SHALT BE KING!"

Mademoiselle Lenormand took the hand, which her client held out to her,

with a feeling almost akin to veneration.

"Will you have the whole truth?" she asked, "or shall I tell you only

the good and conceal the evil, as I would to one of those effeminate

creatures, to whose nervous irritability you are sometimes subject?"

"Tell me all," said the young man briefly.

"See that you remember the order which you have given me," she said,

emphasizing the word "order." "Your hand, which is the most perfect of

any that I have ever seen, presents all the virtuous sentiments, and all

the human weaknesses; it reveals at once the most heroic and the most

hesitating of characters. Most of the lines of your palm dazzle by their

brilliancy, while others seem to point to the darkest and most painful

hours. I am about to reveal to you an enigma more difficult to read than

the Theban Sphinx; for even as you will be greater than Œdipus, so will

you be more unhappy. Shall I go on, or shall I stop?"

"Go on," he said.

"I obey you," and again she emphasized the word "obey."

"We will begin with the most powerful of the seven planets; all seven

are impressed upon your hand, and are placed in their recognized order.

"Jupiter is at the extremity of your index finger. Let us begin with

him. Perhaps some confusion will result from this method of procedure,

but we will bring forth order out of chaos.

"Jupiter then in your hand is placed at the extremity of your index

finger, which means that you will be the friend and the enemy of the

great men of this world, and among the fortunate of this age. Notice

this sign in the shape of a fan on the fourth joint of this finger; it

indicates that you will forcibly levy tribute upon people and kings. See

this sort of grafting on the second joint, broken at its seventh branch;

that means that you will occupy in succession six positions of dignity,

and that you will stop at the seventh."

"Do you know what these positions are?"

"No. All that I can tell you about them is that the last is that of

Emperor of the West, which is to-day in the house of Austria.

"See that star under the grating; it betokens that you have a good

genius who will watch over you until your eighth lustre, or until you

are forty years old. At that time you will probably forget that

Providence chose a companion for you, for you will abandon that

companion, as a result of a false calculation of human prosperity. The

two signs directly beneath that star, which resemble, the one a

horseshoe, and the other a chessboard, indicate that after long

prosperity you will inevitably fall, and from the greatest height to

which man has ever attained. You will fall rather through the influence

of women than the strength of men. Four lustres will be the term of your

triumph and power.

"This other sign, at the foot of Jupiter, accompanied by these three

other stars, indicate that during the last three years of your greatness

and prosperity, your enemies will be trying to undermine you, and that

three months will suffice to hurl you from your exalted position, and

that the crash of your fall will resound throughout the East and the

West. Shall I go on?"

"Go on!" said the young man.

"These two stars at the extremity of the middle finger, which is the

finger of Saturn, indicate positively that you will be crowned in the

same metropolis which has witnessed the coronations of the kings of

France, your predecessors. But the sign of Saturn, placed immediately

below these two stars, and governing them, is of the gloomiest import

for you.

"On the second joint of this middle finger there are two signs, which

are peculiar in that they seem to contradict each other. The triangle

denotes a curious, suspicious man, not at all lavish of his means except

to his soldiers, and who during his life will receive three wounds: the

first on the thigh, the second on the heel, and the third on the little

finger. The second of these signs, a star, denotes a magnanimous

sovereign, a lover of the beautiful, forming gigantic projects, which

are not only impossible of realization, but which none but he would be

capable of conceiving.

"This line, which resembles an S, winding over the middle joint,

forebodes, besides various other perils, several attempts at

assassination, among which there is a prearranged explosion.

"The straight line, the letters C and X, which extend almost to the root

of the finger of Saturn, betoken a second alliance, more illustrious

than the first."

"But," interrupted the young man, impatiently, "this is the second or

third time that you have spoken of this first alliance which is to

protect the first eight lustres of my life. How am I to recognize the

lady when I see her?"

"She is dark," replied the sibyl; "the widow of a fair-haired man who

wore a sword and perished by the axe. She has two children, whom you

will adopt for your own. In examining her face you will recognize her by

two things: one is that she has a noticeable mark on one of her

eyebrows, and the second that in talking she frequently raises her

right hand, being accustomed to holding a handkerchief, which she

carries to her mouth whenever she laughs."

"Very well," he returned, "now let us come hack to my horoscope."

"See at the base of the finger of Saturn these two signs, one of which

resembles a gridiron without a handle, and the other the six of

diamonds.

"They predict that your second wife will destroy your happiness, and

that she, unlike your first wife, will be fair and born of a race of

kings.

"The figure representing the image of the sun at the end of the third

joint of the ring finger, which is the finger of Apollo, proves that you

will become an extraordinary personage, rising by your own merit, but

especially favored by Jupiter and Mars.

"These four straight lines, placed like a palisade below this image of

the sun, betoken that you will struggle in vain against a power which,

unaided, will stop you in your career.

"Beneath these four straight lines we find again that serpentine line,

in the form of the letter S, which has already twice predicted

misfortune for you on the finger of Saturn; if the star, which is below

that line, were above it instead, it would indicate that you would

continue in the zenith of your power for seven lustres.

"The fourth finger of the left hand bears the sign of Mercury at the end

of the third joint. This means that few men will possess such sagacity,

knowledge, finesse, exactness of reasoning power and keenness of mind as

you. You will bend several nations to your vast projects; you will

undertake expeditions which will occasion great wonderment; you will

cross deep rivers, ascend steep mountains, and traverse immense deserts.

But this sign of Mercury also denotes that you will have a very abrupt

and capricious temper; that this temper will create powerful enemies

against you; and that in the spirit of a true cosmopolitan, tormented by

lust of conquest, you will not be contented anywhere, and that

sometimes you will even feel that Europe is too confined a sphere for

you.

"As for this ladder which is drawn between the first and third joints of

the finger of Mercury, it denotes that in the days of your power, you

will carry out immense works for the embellishment of your capital as

well as the other cities of your kingdom.

"And now we pass to the thumb, which is the finger of Venus.

"As you see, here is her all-powerful sign on the second joint. It

announces that you will adopt children which are not your own, and that

your first union will be childless, although you have had, and will have

again, natural children. But as compensation, here are the three stars

which are dominated by it; this is a sign that, in spite of the efforts

of the enemy, surrounded by great men who supplement your genius, you

will be crowned between your sixth and seventh lustre, and that the Pope

himself, to gain your favor for the Church of Rome, will come from Rome

to place the crown of Louis XIV. and Saint Louis upon your head and that

of your wife.

"Beneath the three stars, do you see the sign of Venus and that of

Jupiter? Beside them, and on the same line, do you see those numbers

which are so lucky when in conjunction--9, 19, and 99? They are the

proof that the East and West will clasp hands, and that the Cæsars of

the house of Hapsburg will consent to ally their name with yours.

"Below those numbers we find the same sun which we have already seen on

the tip of the finger of Apollo, and which indicates that, contrary to

the celestial luminary, which goes from east to west, your course will

be from west to east.

"Now let us go up from the first joint of this thumb to the O which

crosses a bar diagonally. Well, that sign indicates disordered vision,

political blindness. As for the three stars on the first joint and the

sign which surmounts them, they are only a confirmation of the

prediction that women will have a great influence upon your life, and

they indicate that even as happiness will come to you through a woman,

so will it take flight through a woman.

"As for the four signs scattered about the palm of the hand in the form

of an iron rake, one in the field of Mars, another adhering to the line

of life, and the remaining two adjoining the base of the mountain of The

Moon, they indicate prodigal expenditure of the blood of soldiers, but

only upon the battlefield.

"The top of this forked line, divided toward the mount of Jupiter,

number 8, denotes extended journeys in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Some of

these journeys will be forced ones, as the X at the top of the line of

life denotes, overlooking the mount of Venus. Finally, as its branches

cross beneath the line of Mars, it is a sure sign of great renown, due

to glorious feats of arms. In speaking to you, men will exhaust the

whole vocabulary of humility and eulogy; you will be the glorious man,

the man of prodigies and miracles. You will be Alexander, you will be

Cæsar, you will be even greater than they; you will be Atlas bearing the

world. After seeing the whole universe lighted up with your glory, you

will see it black as night on the day of your death; and men, seeing

that the world is out of joint, will ask, not whether a man has just

died, but whether the sun has set."

The young man had listened to this prophecy with an air of gloom rather

than joy; he had seemed to follow the sibyl to these heights where she

had paused, fatigued, to take breath; then with her he had descended

into the abyss, where, as she said, his fortune would be sunk.

He remained silent a moment after she had ceased.

"You have prophesied Cæsar's fortune for me," he said, after a pause.

"It is greater than Cæsar's," she said; "for Cæsar did not attain his

end, and you will yours. Cæsar put his foot only upon the first step of

the throne, and you will take your seat upon it. But do not forget the

dark woman who has a mark above her right eyebrow, and who carries her

handkerchief to her month when she smiles."

"And when shall I meet her?" asked the young man.

"You have met her to-day," replied the sibyl, "and she marked with her

foot the spot where your long line of victories will begin."

It was so manifestly impossible that the sibyl could have prepared

beforehand this series of undoubted truths which had taken place in the

past, and the succession of incredible facts which were still buried in

the future, that for the first time the young officer believed

thoroughly in what she had told him. He put his hand in his pocket and

drew forth a purse containing some gold-pieces; but the sibyl laid a

detaining hand upon his arm.

"If I have prophesied lies," she said, "the price is too great. If, on

the contrary, I have told you the truth we can settle our account only

at the Tuileries. At the Tuileries, then, when you are Emperor of the

French."

"So be it," replied the young man; "at the Tuileries! And if you have

told me the truth, you will lose nothing by waiting."[5]

[5] We can vouch for the truth of this scene the more confidently

because the details were given us by Mademoiselle Lenormand's friend,

pupil, and confidante, Madame Moreau, who lived in the Rue du Tournon,

No. 5, in the same house with the celebrated sibyl, and who, devoting

herself to the same art, met with great success.

CHAPTER XXXII

THE MAN OF THE FUTURE

The 26th of October, at half-past two in the afternoon, the president of

the Convention pronounced these words: "The National Convention declares

that its mission is fulfilled, and that its sessions are at end." These

words were followed by cries of "Long live the Republic!"

To-day, after the lapse of seventy-two years, and three generations, the

man who writes these lines cannot forbear to bow his head in the

presence of that memorable date.

The long and stormy career of the Convention ended with an act of

clemency. It decreed that the death penalty should be abolished

throughout the territory of the French Republic. It changed the name of

the Place de la Révolution to the Place de la Concorde. And finally it

pronounced an amnesty upon all the deeds relating to the Revolution.

It did not leave a single prisoner in the prisons who had not had a

trial, nor one confined for political offences. It was very strong, very

sure of itself, this assembly that was resigning its power.

O terrible Convention! stern embalmer, who didst lay the eighteenth

century in its blood-stained winding-sheet, thou didst find at thy

birth, on the 21st of September, 1792, Europe in arms against France, a

dethroned king, a constitution annulled, an administration overthrown, a

discredited paper currency, and skeletons of regiments without soldiers!

Thou didst pause a moment, and perceive that, unlike the two assemblies

that had preceded thee, it was not for thee to proclaim liberty before a

worn-out monarchy, but to defend liberty against all the thrones of

Europe!

On the day of thy birth thou didst proclaim the Republic in the face of

two opposing armies, one of which was but one hundred and fifty, and the

other not more than two hundred miles from Paris. Then, in order to burn

thy bridges, thou didst bring to conclusion the king's trial!

When voices rising from thine own bosom cried out, "Humanity!" thou

didst reply, "Energy!"

Thou didst make thyself absolute. From the Alps to the coast of

Brittany, from the ocean to the Mediterranean, thou didst lay hold of

everything and say, "I will answer for everything!"

Like the minister of Louis XII., for whom there were neither friends nor

family, but only enemies of France, and who struck down with the same

hand a Chalais and a Marillac, a Montmorency and a Saint-Preuil, thou

didst not spare thine own members. And finally, after three years of

such convulsions as people had never before experienced, after days

which have come down to posterity as the 21st of January, the 31st of

October, the 5th of April, the 9th and 13th Thermidor, and the 13th

Vendémiaire, bleeding and mutilated, thou didst lay down thy functions,

handing over to the Directory safe and flourishing that France which

thou didst receive from the Constituent Assembly torn asunder and

compromised!

Let those who accuse thee, dare to say what would have happened if thou

hadst not followed thy course, if Condé had entered Paris, if Louis

XVIII. had ascended the throne, if, instead of the twenty years of

Directory, the Consulate, and the Empire, there had been twenty years of

restoration, twenty years of Spain instead of France, twenty years of

shame instead of twenty years of glory!

Now, was the Directory worthy of the legacy bequeathed to it by its

dying mother? That is the question.

The Directory must answer to posterity for its deeds even as the

Convention has answered for its own.

The Directory was appointed. The five members were Barras, Rewbell, La

Reveillière-Lepaux, Letourneur and Carnot. It was decided that they

should take up their official residence at the Luxembourg. They did not

know what was the condition of the Luxembourg. They went there to begin

their sittings. They found not a single article of furniture.

"The concierge," wrote M. Thiers, "lent them a shaky table, a sheet of

letter paper, and a writing-desk, with which to write their first

message announcing to the two councils that the Directory was

established."

They sent to the Treasury. There was not a penny there.

Barras was their chief; Carnot directed the movements of the armies;

Rewbell had charge of the foreign affairs; Letourneur and La

Reveillière-Lepaux of the interior administration. Buonaparte had

command of the Army of Paris. A fortnight later he signed his name

Bonaparte.

* * * * *

On the 9th of the following March, about eleven o'clock in the morning,

two carriages stopped before the door of the mayoralty of the second

district of Paris.

A young man about twenty-six, wearing the uniform of a general officer,

descended from the first. He was followed by two witnesses.

A young woman about twenty-eight or thirty descended from the other. She

was followed by her two witnesses.

The six presented themselves before citizen Charles-Théodore François,

civil magistrate of the second district, who asked them the questions

usually propounded to matrimonial aspirants, to which they made the

customary replies. Then he ordered the following document read to them,

which they afterward signed:

"The 19th Ventôse, in the Year IV. of the Republic."

"Contract of marriage between Napolione Bonaparte,

general-in-chief of the army of the interior, aged _twenty-eight_

years, born at Ajaccio, in the department of Corsica, residing in

Paris, Rue d'Antin, son of Charles Bonaparte, gentleman, and

Lætitia Ramolini:

"And Marie-Rose-Josephine Tascher, aged twenty-eight years, born

in the island of Martinique, in the Windward Islands, residing in

Paris, Rue Chantereine, daughter of Gaspard-Joseph de Tascher,

captain of dragoons, and his wife Rose-Claire Desvergers de

Sanois.

"I, Charles-Théodore François, civil magistrate of the second

district of the canton of Paris, after having in the presence of

these parties and their witnesses, read;

"1st. The certificate of birth of Napolione Bonaparte, which

states that he was born on the _5th of February_, 1768, of the

lawful marriage of Charles Bonaparte and Lætitia Ramolini;

"2d. The certificate of birth of Marie-Rose-Josephine Tascher,

which states that she was born on the 23d of June, of the lawful

marriage of Joseph-Gaspard de Tascher and of Rose-Claire

Desvergers de Sanois;

"The certificate of death of Alexandre-François-Marie de

Beauharnais, being taken into consideration, which states that he

died on the 7th Thermidor, in the year II., married to

Marie-Rose-Josephine de Tascher;

"Also that the certificate of publication of said marriage was

duly posted without opposition during the time prescribed by law;

"And also that Napolione Bonaparte and Marie-Rose-Josephine

Tascher had declared aloud that they took each other for husband

and wife--I did pronounce Napolione Bonaparte and

Marie-Rose-Josephine Tascher to be husband and wife.

"And this in the presence of the adult witnesses hereafter named,

to wit: Paul Barras, member of the executive Directory, living at

the Luxembourg; Captain Jean Lemarrois, aide-de-camp, living in

the Rue des Capucines; Jean-Lambert Tallien, member of the

Corps-Legislatif, living at Chaillot, and Etienne-Jacques-Jerôme

Calmelets, lawyer, living in the Rue de la Place Vendôme, No. 207,

all of whom have signed with the principals, as I have done, after

this reading."

Indeed, one may see the six signatures of M.-R.-J. Tascher, of Napolione

Bonaparte, of Tallien, of Barras, of J. Lemarrois, Jr., of E. Calmelets,

and of C.-T. François, at the foot of the certificate we have just

quoted.

The remarkable thing about this certificate, however, is that it

contains two false statements. Bonaparte was there alleged to be two and

a half years older than he really was, and Josephine two years younger

than she was. She was born on the 23d of June, 1763, and Bonaparte on

the 15th of August, 1769.

On the day after their marriage Bonaparte was appointed

commander-in-chief of the Army of Italy. This was Barras's wedding gift.

On the 26th of March, Bonaparte arrived at Nice with two thousand louis

in the box of his carriage, and a million in drafts.

Jourdan and Moreau had been given a magnificent army of seventy thousand

men. But the Directory only dared trust Bonaparte with thirty thousand

men, who were famished, in want of everything, reduced to the last

extremity, without clothes, shoes or pay, and most of the time without

provisions, but who nevertheless bore all their privations, even hunger,

with admirable fortitude.

His officers were Masséna, a young Niçard, headstrong and obstinate, but

full of happy inspirations; Augereau, whom we have already met at

Strasbourg, where we saw him handle the foil against Eugene, and the

musket against the Austrians; La Harpe, a banished Swiss; Serrurier, a

soldier of the old school, painstaking and brave; and finally Berthier,

the chief of his staff, whose good qualities he had already

divined--qualities which improved every day.

With his thirty thousand soldiers he had to fight sixty thousand, twenty

thousand Piedmontese under General Collé, and forty thousand Austrians

under General Beaulieu. These generals looked with disdain at the young

general, their junior in years, who it was said owed his position to

Barras's patronage--small, thin and proud, with an Arab complexion,

piercing eyes and Roman features.

As for the soldiers, they responded to the first words that he spoke to

them; it was the kind of talk they needed. He said:

"Soldiers, you are poorly fed, and almost naked; the government owes you

much, but it can do nothing for you now. Your courage and patience are

worthy of all honor; but if you remain here they will procure neither

profit nor glory. I am about to lead you to the most fertile plains in

the world. You will find great cities and beautiful provinces there; you

will find riches, honor, and glory. Follow me!"

That same day he distributed four gold louis to the generals, who had

not seen gold for years, and removed his headquarters to Albenga. He was

eager to reach Voltri, which was the place that Josephine had marked

with her foot the first time that she had called upon him.

He reached Arenza the 11th of April.

Would he meet the enemy? Would he obtain this pledge of his future

fortune?

As he ascended the slope of Arenza, at the head of the division La

Harpe, which formed the advance guard, he uttered a cry of joy; he had

just seen a column leaving Voltri. It was Beaulieu and the Austrians.

They fought for five days, at the end of which time Bonaparte was master

of the Valley of the Bormida. The Austrians, defeated at Montenotte and

Dego, retreated toward Acqui, and the Piedmontese, after losing the

passes of Millesiome, fell back upon Ceva and Mondovi.

Master of all the roads, with nine thousand prisoners in his train, who

were to be sent to France to herald his first victory, from the heights

of Monte Remonto he pointed out to his soldiers the beautiful plains of

Italy, which he had promised them. He showed them all the rivers which

empty into the Adriatic and the Mediterranean, and pointing to a

gigantic mountain covered with snow, he exclaimed: "Hannibal crossed the

Alps; we have turned them."

Thus we see that Hannibal naturally presented himself to his mind as a

medium of comparison. Later it was Cæsar. Later still it was

Charlemagne.

We have witnessed the birth of his fortune. Let us leave the conqueror

at the first station in his journey across the world. He is fairly

started on the road to Milan, Cairo, Vienna, Berlin, Madrid, and, alas!

to Moscow.

THE EIGHTEENTH FRUCTIDOR

CHAPTER I

A GLANCE AT THE PROVINCES

On the evening of the 28th of May, 1797, at the moment when, his

glorious campaign in Italy finished, Bonaparte was enthroned with

Josephine at Montebello, surrounded by ministers from foreign courts;

when the Corinthian horses, having descended from the Duomo, and the

Lion of Saint Mark, having fallen from its column, were on their way to

Paris; when Pichegru, relieved from service on account of vague

suspicions, had just been made president of the Five Hundred, and

Barbé-Marbois president of the Ancients--a horseman, who was travelling,

as Virgil says, "under the friendly silence of the moon" ("Per amica

silentia lunæ"), and who was trotting upon a powerful horse along the

road from Mâcon to Bourg, left that road a little above the village of

Polias. He jumped, or rather made his horse jump, the ditch which

separated the road from the plowed fields, and followed the banks of the

river Veyle for about five hundred yards, where he was not liable to

meet either villager or traveller. There, doubtless no longer fearing to

be recognized or noticed, he allowed his coat to slip from his shoulders

to the saddle, thereby discovering a belt in which he carried two

pistols and a hunting-knife. Then he lifted his hat and wiped his

perspiring forehead. The traveller was a young man of twenty-eight or

nine years of age, handsome, distinguished, and well-built; and it was

evident that he was prepared to repel force by force if any one should

have the temerity to attack him.

And, by the way, the precaution which had caused him to put a pair of

pistols in his belt was by no means an unwarranted one. The Thermidorean

reaction, suppressed in Paris on the 13th Vendémiaire, had taken refuge

in the provinces, where it had assumed gigantic proportions. Lyons was

become its headquarters; on one side, by way of Nîmes, it stretched out

its hand to Marseilles, and on the other, by way of Bourg in Bresse, as

far as Besançon. For further information regarding this reaction we

might refer our reader to our romance "The Companions of Jehu," or to

Charles Nodier's "Souvenirs de la Revolution et de l'Empire"; but as the

reader will probably not have either of these two works at hand, we will

briefly reproduce here what is necessary for our purpose.

It was not to be wondered at that the Thermidorean reaction, suppressed

in the first capital of France, had taken up its abode in the second,

with branches at Marseilles and Besançon. What Lyons suffered after the

revolt is well known. The guillotine was too slow, and Collot d'Herbois

and Fouché supplemented it with grape and canister. There were few

families at that time, belonging either to the rich commercial classes

or the nobility, who had not lost one or more of its members. The time

had now come to avenge the lost father, brother or son; and they were

avenged openly, publicly, in broad daylight. "You caused the death of my

father, my son, or my brother," they would say to the informer, and then

they would immediately strike him down.

"Speculation in regard to murder," says Nodier, "was largely indulged in

among the upper classes. There, secrets of murder were recounted in the

salons which would have terrified the galleys. Men played _Charlemagne_

with death for the stakes, without even taking the trouble to lower

their voices when they discussed their plans of killing. The women,

sweet alleviators of all the passions of men, took part in these

dreadful discussions of death. Since horrible hags no longer wore

guillotines for ear-rings, 'adorable furies,' as Corneille would have

said, wore daggers for breast-pins. If you objected on sentimental

grounds to these frightful excesses, they would take you to the

Brotteaux and make you tread, in spite of yourself, upon the elastic

springy soil, saying: 'Our relatives are there.' What a picture do these

exceptional times present, whose nameless, indefinable character cannot

be expressed by the facts themselves, so inadequate are words to

reproduce the unheard of confusion of ideas, so antipathetic in

themselves, the union of the most refined methods with implacable fury,

the horrifying compact between the doctrines of humanity and deeds

worthy of cannibalism. How can we convey an adequate impression of this

impossible time when prison-cells did not protect the prisoners, when

the executioner, who came in search of his victim, found, to his

astonishment, that he had been preceded by the assassin--this

never-ending 2d of September, renewed every day by respectable young men

who had just left a salon, and who were expected in a boudoir?

"It was, it must be admitted, a localized monomania--a craving for rage

and murder which had sprung into life under the wings of revolutionary

harpies; an appetite for larceny, sharpened by confiscations; a thirst

for blood, inflamed by the sight of blood. It was the frenzy of a

generation nourished, like Achilles, upon the marrow of wild animals; a

generation which had no model or ideal other than Schiller's brigands

and the free-booters of the Middle Ages. It was the sharp irresistible

desire to renew society by the means which had destroyed it--crime. It

was the inevitable result of the immutable tendency of compensation in

remarkable times; the Titans after Chaos; Python after the deluge; a

flock of vultures after the battle; the unerring law of retaliation for

those unaccountable scourges which demand death for death, corpse for

corpse, which pays itself with usury, and which Holy Writ counts among

the treasures of Providence.

"The unexpected amalgamation of these bands, whose object was at first

unknown, exhibited at first in a slight degree the inevitable confusion

of ranks, conditions, and persons which is noticeable in all factions

and parties which are the outgrowth of a disorganized society; but there

was less in this case than had ever been seen before. That portion of

the lower classes which participated in the movement did not lack the

varnish of manner which is the result of expensive vices; an

aristocratic populace which ran from one debauch to another, and from

one excess to another, in the wake of the nobility of name and fortune,

as if to prove that there is nothing more facile of emulation than a bad

example. The remainder concealed beneath a most refined exterior a more

odious depravity, because it had to break down the barriers of

conventionality and education. Never before had so many assassins in

silk stockings been seen; and it would have been a great mistake to

imagine that luxurious habits existed in an inverse ratio to ferocity of

character. Pitiless examples of mad fury were no less common among men

of the world than among men of the people, and death was found to

possess no less cruel refinements when inflicted by the dagger of the

dandy than when inflicted by the knife of the butcher.

"The proscribed had at first eagerly sought the shelter of the prisons

as a refuge. When this melancholy bulwark was destroyed, like everything

else that men had formerly held sacred--like the churches and the

tombs--the administration endeavored to provide for the safety of the

victims by sending them out of the provinces. To protect them from

private vengeance, the authorities sent them sixty or eighty miles away

from their wives and children, among men who knew neither their names

nor their station. The fatal move only resulted in changing the place of

sepulchre. These parties in death exchanges delivered their prey from

one department to another with the regularity of commercial

transactions. Never had business-like habits been thus degraded to

horrible traffic. Nor were these barbarous drafts, payable in men's

heads, protested when they came due. As soon as the letter of advice

arrived they would coolly balance debits and credits, and carry forward

the balances, and the check drawn in blood would be honored at sight.

"This spectacle, the very idea of which is revolting to the soul, was

often renewed. Picture to yourself one of those long carts with racks in

which animals are taken to the shambles, and hurdled upon them in

confusion, men, their hands and feet securely tied with cords, their

heads hanging down, swaying with each jolt of the cart, panting for

breath, in despair and terror, for crimes of which the greatest was an

excited outburst which had spent itself in threatening words. Do not

imagine for a second that the feast of the martyrs or the expiatory

honors of the sacrifice were prepared for them on their return, or that

they were even allowed the empty satisfaction of offering for a moment

an impossible resistance to an attack without peril, as in the arenas of

Constantius and Gallus. The assassins surprised them as they lay; and

they were murdered in their bonds, and the club, reddened with blood,

continued to play upon their bodies long after they had ceased to feel."

Nodier once saw and described to me a septuagenarian noted for his

gentleness of manner and that scrupulous courtesy which is esteemed

above all else in provincial salons; one of those men of breeding who

are becoming almost extinct, and who used to make one visit to Paris to

pay their court to the minister, and to be present at the king's

card-party and hunting-party, and who owed to this happy memory the

privilege of dining from time to time with the _intendant_, and of

giving their opinion on important occasions upon questions of etiquette.

Nodier saw him--while women looked on calmly holding their children in

their arms, and while the latter clapped their little hands--Nodier saw

him, and I quote his very words, "wearying his withered old arm striking

a corpse with his gold-headed cane, in which the assassins had neglected

to extinguish the last spark of life, and which had just betrayed its

agony by a final convulsion."

And now that we have tried to give some idea of the state of the country

through which the traveller was passing, no wonder will be felt at the

precautions which he had deemed advisable to take, nor at the attention

he paid to every turn of the country, with which he seemed wholly

unfamiliar. In fact, he had not followed the banks of the Veyle for more

than a mile and a half before he reined in his horse, stood up in his

stirrups, and, leaning over his saddle, tried to pierce the darkness,

which had deepened since a cloud had passed over the face of the moon.

He began to despair of finding his way without being forced to secure

the services of a guide, either at Montech or at Saint-Denis, when a

voice, coming apparently from the depths of the river, startled him, so

unexpected was it. It said in the most cordial tone: "Can I assist you

in any way, citizen?"

"Faith, yes," replied the traveller; "and as I cannot come to you, not

knowing where you are, perhaps you will be so good as to come to me,

since you apparently do know where I am."

And thus speaking he covered his pistols, and the hand which was playing

with them, with his cloak.

CHAPTER II

THE TRAVELLER

The traveller had not been mistaken; the voice did come from the river.

A shadow slowly ascended the bank, and in a moment stood at the horse's

head, with one hand resting on the bridle. The rider, apparently annoyed

by this familiarity, pulled his horse back a step or two.

"Oh! I beg your pardon, citizen," said the new-comer, "I did not know it

was forbidden to touch your horse."

"It is not forbidden," said the traveller; "but you know at night, and

in these times, it is advisable to converse at a certain distance."

"The deuce! I cannot distinguish what is advisable from what is not. You

seemed unable to find your way; I saw it, and I said to myself, as I am

a good fellow, 'Here is a Christian who does not seem to know his way

about, so I will direct him.' You called to me to come to you, and here

I am. You do not need me; good-by!"

"Your pardon, friend," said the other, restraining him with a gesture,

"the movement of my horse was an involuntary one. I do really need you,

and you can do me a service."

"What is it? Tell me. Oh! I bear no malice."

"Do you belong to this region?"

"I come from Saint-Rémy, near by. You can see the church from here."

"Then you know the neighborhood?"

"I should think so. I am a fisherman by trade. There is not a run of

water for thirty miles around into which I have not cast my lines."

"Then you must know the abbey of Seillon?"

"Do I know the abbey of Seillon! I should think so. But I can't say as

much for the monks."

"And why can't you say as much for the monks?"

"Why, because they have been driven out since 1797, of course."

"Then to whom does the Chartreuse belong?"

"To no one."

"What? A farm, a convent, a forest of ten thousand acres, and three

thousand acres of land besides, here in France, which belongs to no

one?"

"They belong to the Republic, which amounts to the same thing."

"Then the Republic does not cultivate the land which it confiscates?"

"As if it had the time! It has plenty of other things to do, has this

Republic."

"What has it to do?"

"It has to make a new skin."

"True--it is putting on its third. Do you bother your head with such

things?"

"Oh! a little in my spare time. Our neighbors of the Jura have sent the

Republic General Pichegru, just the same."

"Yes."

"They can't have liked that very well over yonder. But here I am

chattering and wasting your time. After all, though, if you are going to

Seillon, you need not hurry."

"Why not?"

"Why, because there is no one there."

"No one?"

"The deuce, not unless it be the ghosts of the old monks, and they don't

appear until midnight, so you will have to wait."

"Are you sure, my friend," persisted the traveller, "that there is _no

one_ at the abbey of Seillon?" And he emphasized the words.

"I passed there yesterday, when I was carrying some fish to Madame de

Montrevel at the Château des Noires-Fontaines; there was not even a cat

there." Then he added emphatically: "They were all priests of Baal, so

there is not much harm done."

The traveller started, more visibly than at first.

"_Priests of Baal?_" he asked, looking fixedly at the fisherman.

"Yes, and unless you come from a certain king of Israel whose name I

have forgotten--"

"From King Jehu, you mean, do you not?"

"I am not sure; it was a king who was consecrated by a

prophet--named--named--What was the name of the prophet who consecrated

King Jehu?"

"Elisha," responded the traveller, without hesitation.

"That is it. But he consecrated him on one condition. What was that

condition? Help me to remember."

"That he punish the crimes of the house of Ahab and Jezebel."

"The deuce! Tell me about it at once;" and he held out his hand to the

traveller.

The traveller and the fisherman gave each other a final sign of

recognition, which left neither of them in doubt that they both belonged

to the same association. However, they did not question each other as to

their personal affairs, nor as to the work which they both had in hand,

the one in going to the abbey of Seillon, the other in setting his lines

and tents. But the young fisherman said:

"I am sorry that I am kept here by superior orders; if it were not for

that I would gladly serve as your guide; but I cannot return to the

Chartreuse until they have given me the signal. But there is no longer

any need to deceive you. You see those two black masses of which one is

higher than the other? The higher one is the town of Bourg; the lower

the village of Saint-Denis. Pass between the two at an equal distance,

and continue on your way until you are stopped by the bed of the

Reissouse. You can cross it, for the water will scarcely reach to your

horse's knees; then you will see a great black curtain before you. That

is the forest."

"Thanks," said the traveller; "once in the forest, I know what to do."

"Even if they do not reply to your signal from the forest?"

"Yes."

"Well, go then, and good luck to you."

The two young men shook hands once again, and the young fisherman

descended the bank with the same rapidity with which he had ascended it.

The traveller mechanically stretched out his neck to see what had become

of him. He was invisible. Then the traveller gathered up his reins, and

as the moon had come out and he had an open field to cross, he put his

horse to a gallop, and was soon between Bourg and Saint-Denis.

The clock struck in both places at the same time. The traveller counted

eleven strokes.

After crossing the road from Lyons to Bourg, the traveller found

himself, as the fisherman had said, on the banks of a little river. His

horse reached the other side with two strides, and when there he saw

before him a plain about two hundred yards wide, bounded by a dark line,

which he had been told was the forest. He spurred his horse straight for

it.

Ten minutes later he was riding along a country road which skirted the

forest in its whole length. There he stopped a moment and looked around

him. He did not hesitate to give the signal agreed upon, but he wished

to make sure that he was alone. The silence of the night is at times so

intense that the most daring men respect it, unless they are forced to

break it. For a moment then, as we have said, our traveller looked and

listened, but he neither saw nor heard anything. He put his hand to his

mouth and whistled thrice with the handle of his whip, the first and

last being strong and resonant, the second tremulous, like a boatswain's

whistle. The sound was lost in the depths of the forest, but no sound,

either similar or dissimilar, replied to it. While he listened, midnight

struck at Bourg, and was repeated by all the clocks of the neighborhood.

The traveller repeated the signal a second time, and again silence was

his only answer.

Then he seemed to make up his mind, and following the country road until

he came to one at right angle with it, he resolutely plunged into the

latter; ten minutes later he came to another, which crossed it again,

and following this crossroad, he bore to the left, and five minutes

later was out of the forest.

A dark mass rose before him some two hundred yards away, which was

doubtless the goal of his journey. As he approached it he studied

certain details to make sure that this was really the old Chartreuse

before him.

At last he stopped before a great portal surmounted by three statues,

those of the Virgin, of Our Lord, and of Saint John the Baptist. The

statue of the Virgin, placed directly over the door, formed the apex of

the triangle. The two others came down to the cross-piece, forming the

branch of the stone cross, in which a double door of massive oak was

set, which, more fortunate than certain other portions of the frontal,

and more particularly the windows on the first floor, seemed to have

survived the ravages of time.

"Here it is," said the traveller; "and now to see which of the three

statues is that of Saint John."

CHAPTER III

THE CHARTREUSE OF SEILLON

The traveller found the statue he sought standing in the niche at the

right of the great door. He brought his horse close to the wall, and

standing up in his stirrups, he reached the base of the pedestal of the

statue; he slipped his hand into it, felt a ring, drew it to him, and

guessed at rather than heard the tinkling of a little bell. This he

repeated three times. After the third time he listened. He thought he

heard a hesitating step approach the door.

"Who rang?" asked a voice.

"He who comes in the name of the prophet," replied the traveller.

"What prophet?"

"He who has left his mantle to his disciples."

"What is his name?"

"Elisha."

"Who is the king of Israel whom the children of Israel must obey?"

"Jehu."

"What is the house they are to exterminate?"

"That of Ahab."

"Are you a prophet or a disciple?"

"I am a disciple, but I have come to be made a prophet."

"Then welcome to the House of the Lord."

Scarcely had these words been uttered than the iron bars which held the

door were noiselessly removed, the bolts shot as noiselessly back into

their sockets, and the door opened silently, as if by magic.

The rider and his horse disappeared beneath the arch. The door closed

behind them. The man who had opened it so slowly and closed it so

quickly approached the new-comer as he dismounted.

The latter looked curiously at him. He was dressed in the long white

robes of the Carthusian monks, and his hood entirely concealed his head.

He took the horse's bridle, but evidently more as a favor than as a

duty. In the meantime the traveller unfastened his valise from the

saddle, and drawing his pistols from their holsters, put them in his

belt with the others.

The traveller glanced around him, and seeing no light and hearing no

sound, he asked: "Are the Companions absent?"

"They have gone on an expedition," replied the brother.

"Do you expect them back to-night?"

"I hope for them to-night, but I scarcely expect them before to-morrow

night."

The traveller reflected for a moment. Their absence seemed to disturb

him.

"I cannot lodge in the town," said he; "I should be afraid of being

noticed, if not recognized. Can I wait here for the Companions?"

"Yes, if you will give me your word of honor not to attempt to go away."

"You have it."

In the meantime the robe of a second monk appeared in the shadow,

growing whiter as he approached the spot where they were standing. He

was doubtless a Companion of a lower order, for the first one tossed the

horse's bridle to him, telling him to take the horse to the stable, more

in the way of command than of request. Then, holding out his hand to

the traveller, he said: "You understand why we have no lights. This

monastery is supposed to be uninhabited, or at least inhabited by ghosts

only; a light would betray us. Take my hand and follow me."

The traveller removed his glove and took the monk's hand. It was a soft

hand, evidently unused to all labors which deprive this member of its

pristine, aristocratic appearance. In the circumstances in which the

traveller found himself everything was of importance. He perceived at

once that he had to do with a man of innate good breeding, and followed

him without hesitation. After several turns in corridors that were

perfectly dark, they entered a rotunda which was lighted from above.

This was evidently the dining-room of the Companions. It was lighted by

candles placed in candelabra on the walls. A fire was burning in a large

fireplace, fed by dry wood, which made little or no smoke.

The monk handed the traveller a chair, and said: "If our brother is

weary, let him rest; if our brother is hungry, supper will be served

him; if he wishes to sleep, he will be shown to his bed."

"I accept them all," said the traveller, stretching out his shapely and

powerful limbs. "The chair because I am weary, the supper because I am

hungry, the bed because I am sleepy. But with your permission, my very

dear brother, we will take them in turn."

He threw his broad-brimmed hat upon the table, and passing his hand

through his wavy hair, he revealed a high forehead, beautiful eyes, and

a serene expression. The monk who had led the horse to the stable now

entered, and in answer to his companion's questions said that he had

given it fresh straw and that its manger was full of hay. Then, in

obedience to an order, he laid a napkin at the end of the table and

placed upon it a bottle of wine, a glass, a cold chicken, a pie, a

plate, a knife, and a fork.

"Whenever you like, my brother," said the monk, pointing to the laden

table.

"At once," said the traveller. And without rising from his chair he drew

up to the table.

He bravely attacked the chicken, of which he took first the leg and then

the wing upon his plate. Then came the pie, of which he ate a slice,

while he sipped his wine. The monk, in the meantime, stood quietly a few

steps behind him. The monk was not inquisitive and the traveller was

hungry, so neither of them uttered a word. When the meal was finished,

the traveller drew his watch from his pocket.

"Two o'clock," he said; "still two hours before daylight." Then,

addressing the monk, he asked: "If our Companions do not come to-night

we need not expect them before to-morrow night, I suppose?"

"Probably not," replied the monk; "save in cases of absolute necessity

our Companions never travel by day."

"Well," said the traveller, "I will wait one of these two hours; if they

have not returned by three o'clock you may show me to my room. In the

meantime, if you have anything to do, do not disturb yourself about me.

You belong to a silent order and I never chatter except with women. You

have none here, have you?"

"No," replied the monk.

"Well, then, go about your business if you have any, and leave me to my

thoughts."

The monk bowed and withdrew, but before he went he placed a second

bottle of wine upon the table. The guest acknowledged the attention with

a bow, and mechanically continued to sip his wine and nibble his crust

of pie.

"If this is the ordinary fare of our Carthusians," he thought, "I do not

pity them. Pomard for every-day wine, a chicken (to be sure we are in

the country of chickens), and snipe pie! However, there is no dessert."

The thought had hardly shaped itself in his mind when the monk, who had

already served both horse and rider, entered, bearing on a dish a fine

slice of Sassenage cheese dotted with green, the invention of which, it

is said, dates from the fairy Melusine. Without being a gourmand, the

traveller, as we have seen, seemed quite able to appreciate a good

supper. He did not say with Brillat-Savarin, "A good meal without cheese

is like a woman without an eye," but doubtless he thought so.

An hour passed while he finished his wine and picked up the crumbs of

the cheese with the point of his knife. The monk had left him alone, and

he was consequently able to devote himself to this double occupation. He

drew out his watch. It was three o'clock.

He looked for a bell but found none. He was on the point of striking his

glass with his knife, when it occurred to him that this would be taking

a great liberty with the good monks who had treated him so hospitably.

Therefore, wishing to keep the promise he had made himself of going to

bed, he laid his weapons on the table, that he might not be suspected of

breaking his word, and bareheaded, with only his hunting knife at his

side, he passed out into the corridor by which he had entered. Half-way

down he met the monk who had received him.

"Brother," said the monk, "we have seen two signals announcing that the

Companions are approaching; they will be here in five minutes. I was

just on my way to tell you."

"Well," said the traveller, "let us go to meet them."

The monk made no objection. He turned back and entered the courtyard

followed by the stranger. The second monk opened the double door as he

had done for the traveller. The door once open, the gallop of several

horses was plainly discernible.

"Make room," said the monk to the traveller, drawing him aside against

the wall.

At the same moment a whirlwind of men and horses swept under the arch

with a noise like that of thunder.

The traveller thought for a moment that the Companions were pursued, but

he was mistaken.

CHAPTER IV

THE TRAITOR

The door closed behind them. Daylight had not yet come, but the darkness

was less profound. The traveller was surprised to see that the

Companions had a prisoner with them. His hands were tied behind his

back, and he was fastened to a horse which two of the Companions were

leading. These three had entered first and had galloped to the end of

the courtyard. Two by two the others had followed and had surrounded

them. All had then dismounted. The prisoner had remained on horseback

for a moment; then they had taken him down.

"Let me speak to Captain Morgan," said the traveller to the monk who had

attended him. "He must know at once that I am here."

The monk went and whispered a few words in the leader's ears, who

hastened to the traveller's side.

"From whom do you come?" he asked.

"Shall I use the ordinary formula," asked the traveller, "or shall I

simply tell you from whom I really come?"

"Since you are here, you have probably satisfied all requirements. Tell

me who sent you."

"General Roundhead."

"You have a letter from him?"

"Here it is." And the traveller put his hand to his pocket, but Morgan

stopped him.

"Later," said he. "First we must try a traitor. Take the prisoner to the

council-chamber," he added.

Just then they caught the gallop of a second troop of horsemen. Morgan

listened attentively.

"Those are our brothers," said he; "open the door."

The door was opened.

"Draw back!" cried Morgan.

And a second company of four men entered almost as rapidly as the first.

"Have you the prisoner?" cried their leader.

"Yes," replied the Companions of Jehu with one accord.

"And you," asked Morgan, "have you the report?"

"Yes," replied the four with one voice.

"Then all is well," replied Morgan, "and justice will be done."

This is what had happened:

As we have said, several bands, known by the name of Companions of Jehu,

or Avengers, and sometimes by both, scoured the country from Marseilles

to Besançon. One had its headquarters in the neighborhood of Avignon, a

second in the Jura, and a third, as we have seen, in the old Chartreuse

of Seillon.

As all these young men belonged to families residing in the

neighborhood, as soon as each undertaking was accomplished, whether or

not successfully, they returned to their respective homes. A quarter of

an hour later our pillager of diligences, with his hat perched over his

ear, his eyeglass in his eye, and his stick in his hand, was walking

through the town asking what had happened, and marvelling at the

incredible insolence of these fellows to whom nothing was sacred, not

even the cash of the Directory. Now, how could young men, some of whom

were rich, and all of whom were connected with the ruling powers of the

neighborhood, be suspected of highway robbery? Nor were they

suspected--though, had they been, no one would have taken it upon

himself to denounce them.

However, the government was much annoyed to see its money turned from

its original destination--the coffers of the Directory at Paris--into

those of the Chouans in Brittany. They therefore decided to play a trick

upon their enemies.

In one of the diligences used to convey money, they placed seven or

eight gendarmes dressed as citizens, who had sent their pistols and

carbines beforehand to the diligence, and who had received express

orders to take one of the outlaws alive. The thing had been planned so

cleverly that the Companions of Jehu had heard nothing about it. The

vehicle, with the modest appearance of an ordinary diligence--that is to

say, filled with honest bourgeois--ventured into the pass of Cavaillon,

and was stopped by eight masked men. A sharp discharge of firearms from

within the coach disclosed the trick to the Companions, who, not

desirous of entering into a profitless struggle, set off at a gallop,

and, thanks to the excellence of their horses, soon disappeared. But one

horse had his leg broken by a ball, and fell on his rider. The horseman,

held down by the animal, could not escape, and the gendarmes thus

fulfilled the double duty of defending the government money, and of

capturing one of those who sought to lay hands on it.

Like the old free-booters, like the Illuminati of the eighteenth

century, like the Freemasons of modern times, the members of this

society, in order to become affiliated with it, underwent brutal tests,

and took blood-curdling oaths. One of these oaths was never to betray a

Companion, no matter what torture might be inflicted. If the name of a

Companion escaped him, or if, weakness overcoming him, any facts escaped

his lips, then the Companions, taking the place of that justice which

granted mercy or softened the penalty as a reward for his treachery, had

ordained that the first of their number who should meet him was

justified in burying his dagger in the traitor's heart!

Now the prisoner taken on the road from Marseilles, whose assumed name

was Hector and whose real name was Fargas, after having resisted

promises as well as threats for a long time, finally weary of prison

life, and tortured with loss of sleep--the worst of all tortures--and

being known by his real name, had ended by confessing and naming his

accomplices.

But as soon as this became known, the judges were overwhelmed by such a

deluge of threatening letters and remarks that they resolved to conduct

the trial at the other end of France, and had chosen for that purpose

the little town of Nantua, at the furthest extremity of the Department

of the Ain.

But at the same time that the prisoner was removed to Nantua, with every

precaution taken for his safety, the Companions of Jehu at the

Chartreuse of Seillon received word of the betrayal and the removal of

the traitor.

"It is for you, the most devoted of our brothers," they were told--"it

is for Morgan, the most venturesome and daring of us all, to save the

Companions by destroying the report which accuses them, and likewise to

make a terrible example of the person of the traitor. Let him be tried,

condemned and executed, and exposed to the gaze of all with the avenging

poniard in his breast."

This was the terrible mission which Morgan had just accomplished. He had

gone with ten of his comrades to Nantua. Six of them, after having

gagged the sentinel, had knocked at the prison door and forced the

keeper at the pistol's point to open the gate. Once inside, they had

learned which was Fargas's cell, and, accompanied by the keeper and the

jailer, they had gone to it, locked in the two officials, bound the

young man on a horse, which they had brought with them, and had set off

at a gallop.

The other four, in the meantime, had seized the clerk, had forced him,

at the dead of night, to admit them to the registry, of which he had the

key, as he sometimes worked there all night, when there was great stress

of business. There they had compelled him to surrender all the court

records, together with the interrogatories, which contained the charges

signed with the prisoner's name. Then, to save the clerk, who begged

them not to ruin him, and who had perhaps not made all possible

resistance, they emptied a number of boxes, set fire to them, shut the

door, returned the key to the clerk, who was then free to return home,

and set off at a gallop themselves with the papers in their possession.

It is needless to say that all who had taken part in this expedition had

worn masks.

This is why the second troop, when they entered the courtyard of the

Chartreuse, had asked: "Have you the prisoner?" and why the first troop,

after replying in the affirmative, had asked: "Have you the report?" And

this is also the reason why Morgan had remarked subsequently: "Then all

is well, and justice will be done!"

CHAPTER V

THE JUDGMENT

The prisoner was a young man of twenty-two or three years of age, who

resembled a woman rather than a man, so slender and fair was he. He was

bareheaded and in his shirt sleeves, with pantaloons and boots. The

Companion had seized him in his cell just as he was and had hurried him

away without allowing him an instant's reflection.

His first thought had been that he was rescued. These men who had

entered his cell were beyond question Companions of Jehu; that is to

say, they were men who held the same opinions and belonged to the same

band as himself. But when he found that they had bound his hands, and

when he saw their eyes flashing angrily through their masks, he realized

that he had fallen into hands far more terrible than those of his

judges--the hands of those whom he had betrayed--and that he could hope

for nothing from comrades whom he had been willing to denounce.

On the way he had not asked a single question and no one had spoken to

him. The first words he heard from the lips of his judges were the ones

they had just pronounced. He was very pale, but this pallor was the only

sign of emotion he displayed.

At Morgan's command the pretended monks crossed the cloister. The

prisoner walked first between two of them, each holding a pistol in his

hand.

The cloister crossed, they passed into the garden. This procession of

the twelve marching silently along in the darkness had something

terrifying about it. They approached the door of the subterranean vault.

One of the two who were walking with the prisoner raised a stone,

disclosing a ring beneath it, by means of which he lifted a flagstone

which concealed the entrance to a staircase.

The prisoner hesitated a moment, so closely did the entrance of the

vault resemble that of a tomb. The two monks who walked beside him

descended first; then from a groove in the stone they took two torches

which had been placed there for those who might have occasion to enter

the vault. They struck a light, kindled the torches, and uttered the one

word: "Descend!"

The prisoner obeyed. The monks disappeared to the last man in the vault.

They walked on for several moments until they reached a grating; one of

the monks drew a key from his pocket and opened the grating. It led into

a burial vault.

The whole subterranean chapel stood at the end of the vault, which the

Companions of Jehu used for their council-chamber. A table covered with

black cloth stood in the centre, and twelve carved stalls, which had

formerly been used by the monks when the burial service was being

chanted, extended along the wall on either side of the chapel. On the

table were placed an ink-stand, several pens, and some paper; two iron

brackets projected from the wall, like hands ready to receive the

torches which were placed in them.

The twelve monks seated themselves in the twelve stalls. They made the

prisoner sit upon a stool at the end of the table; on the other side

stood the traveller, the only one who did not wear the monk's cowl and

who was not masked.

Morgan spoke.

"Monsieur Lucien de Fargas," he said, "was it of your own free will,

and without constraint or force from any one, that you asked our

brothers in the Midi to admit you to our association, and that you

became an affiliated member thereof, after the usual initiation under

the name of Hector?"

The young man bowed assent.

"It was of my own free and unrestrained will, without being forced by

any one," he replied.

"You took the customary oaths, and were therefore aware of the terrible

punishment awaiting those who prove false to them?"

"I knew," replied the prisoner.

"You knew that when any Companion, even under torture, reveals the names

of his brethren, he incurs the death-penalty, and that this penalty is

executed without reprieve or delay the moment that proof of his

treachery is furnished?"

"I knew it."

"What could have induced you to break your oaths?"

"The impossibility of resisting the torture of loss of sleep. I resisted

for five nights, on the sixth I asked for death, which was sleep. They

would not give it to me. I sought a means to take my own life; but my

jailers had taken their precautions so well that I could find none. On

the seventh night I yielded. I promised to make disclosures on the

morrow if they would let me sleep; but they insisted that I should speak

at once. It was then in despair, insane from want of sleep, held up by

the two men who prevented me from sleeping, I stammered the four names

of M. de Valensolles, M. de Barjols, M. de Jayat, and M. de Ribier."

One of the monks drew from his pocket the record which they had taken

from the registry, and held it before the prisoner's eyes.

"That is it," said the latter.

"And do you recognize your signature?" asked the monk.

"I recognize it," replied the young man.

"Have you any excuse to offer?" asked the monk.

"None," replied the young man. "I knew when I wrote my signature at the

bottom of that page that I was signing my death-warrant. But I wanted to

sleep."

"Have you any favor to ask before you die?"

"One."

"What is it?"

"I have a sister whom I love and who adores me. Being orphans, we were

educated together; we grew up side by side, and have never been parted.

I should like to write to my sister."

"You are free to do so. But at the end of your letter you must write the

postscript that we shall dictate to you."

"Thanks," said the young man, rising and bowing.

"Will you untie my hands," he added, "so that I may write."

The wish was granted. Morgan, who had been the one to question him,

pushed the paper, pen, and ink toward him. The young man wrote a page

with a hand that did not tremble.

"I have finished, gentlemen," said he; "will you dictate the

postscript?"

Morgan approached and laid one finger on the paper while the prisoner

wrote.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

"Yes," replied the young man.

"I die because I have broken a sacred oath; consequently I acknowledge

that I deserve death. If you wish to give my body Christian burial, it

will be placed to-night in the market-place at Bourg. The dagger which

will be found implanted in my breast will indicate that I do not die the

victim of cowardly assassination, but of a just vengeance."

Morgan then drew from beneath his robe a dagger of which both handle and

blade were forged from a single piece of metal. It was shaped in the

form of a cross so that the condemned could kiss it in his last moments

instead of a crucifix.

"If you wish, sir," said Morgan, "we will accord you the favor of

striking your own death-blow. Here is the dagger. Is your hand sure

enough?"

The young man pondered an instant. Then he said: "No, I fear that I

should fail."

"Very well," said Morgan, "affix the address to your letter."

The young man folded the letter and wrote: "Mademoiselle Diane de

Fargas, Nîmes."

"Now, sir," said Morgan, "you have just ten minutes in which to make

your peace with God."

The old chapel altar, though mutilated, was still standing. The

condemned went to it and knelt down. In the meantime the Companions tore

a slip of paper into twelve parts, one of which bore the tracing of a

dagger. The twelve pieces were then placed in the hat of the messenger

who had arrived just in time to witness this act of vengeance. Then,

before the condemned man had finished his prayers, each monk drew a slip

in turn. The one to whom the function of executioner had fallen said

never a word; he merely took the dagger from the table and tested the

point with his finger. The ten minutes having passed, the young man

rose.

"I am ready," he said.

Then without hesitation or delay, firm and erect, the monk who had drawn

the fatal slip walked straight to him and plunged the dagger into his

heart. A cry of agony, then the thud of a body falling upon the

pavement, and all was over. The condemned man was dead, the blade of the

dagger had pierced his heart.

"Thus perish all the members of our holy order who are false to their

oaths," said Morgan.

And all the monks responded in chorus: "Amen!"

CHAPTER VI

DIANE DE FARGAS

Just as the unfortunate Lucien de Fargas was drawing his last breath in

the subterranean chapel of the Chartreuse of Seillon, a post-chaise

stopped before the inn of the Dragon at Nantua. This inn of the Dragon

had a certain reputation in Nantua and its suburbs, a reputation which

it owed to the well-known opinions of its proprietor, René Servet.

Without knowing why, Master René Servet was a royalist. Thanks to the

distance which stretched between Nantua and all the great centres of

civilization, thanks also to the mild temperament of its inhabitants,

Master René Servet had passed through the Revolution without being in

the least molested for his opinions, well-known though they were.

It must be confessed, though, that the worthy man had done all in his

power to invite persecution. Not only had he retained the name of the

Dauphin for his inn, but on the tail of the fantastic fish on his

sign-board, a tail which protruded insolently from the water, he had

drawn the profile of the poor little prince, who had remained shut up

for four years and who had died, shortly after the Thermidorean

reaction, in the prison of the Temple.

Therefore all those who for sixty miles round the inn of the Dragon--and

their number was great--shared the opinions of René Servet, did not fail

to patronize his inn, and would not have consented to go elsewhere.

It was not astonishing, therefore, that a post-chaise having to stop at

Nantua should leave its passengers rather at the aristocratic inn of the

Dragon than at its democratic rival, the Boule d'Or.

At the sound of the chaise, although it was barely five in the morning,

René Servet leaped out of bed, and putting on his drawers, a pair of

white stockings, list slippers, and a great bath-robe over his

shoulders, and holding his cotton cap in his hand, reached the doorstep

just as a beautiful young woman of twenty or thereabout descended from

the chaise.

She was dressed in black, and in spite of her youth and great beauty she

was travelling alone.

She replied with a nod to René Servet's obsequious salutation, and,

without paying any attention to his offers of service, asked him if he

had a good room in his house with a dressing-room. Master René mentioned

No. 7 on the first floor as the best he had.

The young lady hastened impatiently to the wooden placard where the keys

were hanging from a frame and took down her key herself.

"Sir," said she, "will you be good enough to show me to my room? I want

to ask you some questions. You can send the chambermaid to me when you

go down."

René Servet bowed almost to the floor and hastened to obey. He went

first and the young lady followed. When they reached the room she closed

the door behind them, and, as she seated herself, she addressed the

landlord, who remained standing.

"Master Servet," she said with decision, "I know you both by name and

reputation. Throughout the bloody years that have just elapsed you have

remained a partisan, if not a defender of the good cause. Therefore I

come directly to you."

"You do me honor, madame," replied the innkeeper, bowing.

She resumed: "I shall therefore abandon all circumlocution or evasion,

to which I might resort with a man whose opinions were less well-known

to me, or who was suspected by me. I am a royalist. That gives you a

right to my confidence. I know no one here, not even the president of

the tribunal, for whom I have a letter from his brother-in-law at

Avignon; it is therefore perfectly natural that I should address myself

to you."

"I am waiting, madame," said René Servet, "for you to do me the honor to

tell me what it is that I can do for you."

"Have you heard, sir, that a young man named Lucien de Fargas was

brought to the prison at Nantua a few days ago?"

"Alas! yes, madame; it seems that he is to be tried here, or rather at

Bourg. He is a member, so I am told, of the secret society called the

Companions of Jehu."

"Do you know the purpose of that society, sir?" asked the young woman.

"I believe that they are to seize the government money and to forward it

to our friends in the Vendée and Brittany."

"Exactly, sir; and the government treats these men like ordinary

thieves!"

"I believe, madame," said René Servet, in a voice full of confidence,

"that our judges are sufficiently intelligent to differentiate between

them and ordinary malefactors."

"But to come to the point. It was thought that my brother ran some risk

in the prison at Avignon, and it was to protect him that he was removed

to the other end of France. I wish to see him. To whom ought I to apply

to obtain this favor?"

"Why, madame, to the very president to whom you have that letter."

"What sort of a man is he?"

"A prudent man, but well-meaning, I hope. I will have you taken to his

house whenever you wish."

Mademoiselle de Fargas drew out her watch. It was scarcely half-past

five in the morning.

"But I cannot present myself at such an hour," she said. "Shall I go to

bed? I am not sleepy." Then, after thinking for a moment, she asked: "On

what side of the town is the prison?"

"If madame would like to take a turn that way," replied Master Servet,

"I would beg the honor of accompanying her."

"Very well, sir. Send me a glass of milk, coffee, tea, whatever you

please, and finish your toilet. While I am waiting for leave to enter, I

should like to see the walls behind which my brother is confined."

The innkeeper made no remark; the desire was a natural one. He went down

and sent her in a cup of coffee and some milk. Ten minutes later she

came down and found him dressed in his Sunday clothes, ready to guide

her through the streets of the little town, which was founded by the

Benedictine Saint-Amand, and in whose church Charles the Bold sleeps

more tranquilly than ever he did in life.

The town of Nantua is not large. A five minutes' walk brought them to

the prison, where they found a crowd full of excitement.

Everything arouses foreboding in the minds of those whose friends are in

danger. Mademoiselle de Fargas had more than a friend--an adored

brother, who was lying in prison, charged with a capital offence. It

seemed to her that her brother must be involved in the excitement which

had caused the crowd to assemble. Growing pale, she seized the guide's

arm, crying: "Oh! my God! what has happened?"

"We shall soon see, mademoiselle," replied René Servet, much less easily

moved than his companion.

No one knew positively what had happened. When they had come to relieve

the sentinel at two o'clock they had found him gagged and bound hand and

foot in his box. All that he could tell was that he had been surprised

by four men, and that he had offered a desperate resistance, which had

ended in their leaving him in the state in which his comrades had found

him. He could give no information concerning what had passed after he

had been bound and gagged. He believed, however, that the prisoner had

been the object of the attack. The mayor, the commissioner of police,

and the fireman's sergeant had then been notified of what had occurred.

These three digitaries had then held council, had summoned the sentinel

before them, and there he had repeated the same story.

After a half hour of deliberation and surmises, each one more ridiculous

than its predecessor, they resolved to end where they ought to have

begun, by going to the prison. But, in spite of prolonged knocking, no

one came to admit them. But the strokes of the knocker aroused the

people in the adjacent houses. They came to the windows, and a series of

questions and answers passed, which resulted in a locksmith being sent

for.

In the meantime the dawn had come, several dogs began to bark, and the

occasional passers-by had grouped themselves round the mayor and the

police commissioner; and when the sergeant returned with a locksmith,

about four o'clock in the morning, he found quite a crowd gathered in

front of the prison doors. The locksmith remarked that if the doors were

bolted on the inside all the picklocks in the world would be of no

avail. But the mayor, a man of great good sense, ordered him to try

first, and if he failed they could devise some other means later. Now,

as the Companions of Jehu had been unable to close the door on the

outside and to bolt it on the inside at one and the same time, they had

simply pulled it to after them; and to the great satisfaction of

everybody the door had opened at once.

Then everybody tried to rush into the prison; but the mayor placed the

sergeant on guard before the door, with orders to keep them all out.

They had to obey the law. The crowd increased, but the mayor's order was

respected.

There are not many cells in the prison of Nantua; they consist of three

subterranean chambers, in one of which they could hear groans. These

groans attracted the attention of the mayor, who interrogated those who

were making them through the door, and soon found that they were none

other than the doorkeeper and the jailer themselves.

They had proceeded thus far with the municipal investigation, when Diane

de Fargas and the landlord of the inn of the Dragon arrived in the

square before the prison.

CHAPTER VII

WHAT WAS TALKED ABOUT FOR MORE THAN THREE MONTHS IN THE LITTLE TOWN OF

NANTUA

To Master René's first question, "For heaven's sake! what is going on in

the prison, friend Bodoux?" the person thus addressed replied:

"The most extraordinary things that were ever known, Monsieur Servet!

When they came to relieve the sentinel this morning, they found him

gagged and tied up like a sausage; and just now it seems that they have

found Père Rossignol and his turnkey shut up in a cell. What times we

live in, good Lord! What times we live in!"

From the very grotesqueness of the reply, Diane saw that he was telling

the truth. It was clear to any intelligent person that if the jailer and

the turnkey were inside, the prisoner must be outside.

Diane dropped Master René's arm, darted through the crowd, made her way

toward the prison, and finally reached the door.

Here she heard some one say: "The prisoner has escaped!"

At the same time, Père Rossignol and the turnkey appeared within the

jail, having been released from the cell in the first place by the

locksmith, who had opened the door, and in the second place by the mayor

and the police commissioner, who had unbound them.

"You cannot pass," said the sergeant to Diane.

"That order may apply to every one else," said Diane, "but not to me. I

am the sister of the escaped prisoner."

This reasoning was not very conclusive in point of law, but it carried

with it the logic of the heart, which few men can resist.

"Oh! that is another thing," said the sergeant, lifting his sword. "Pass

on, mademoiselle!"

And Diane passed in, to the great astonishment of the crowd, who saw the

curtain rising upon a new phase of the drama, and muttered: "It is the

prisoner's sister!"

Now everybody in Nantua knew who the prisoner was, and for what cause he

was imprisoned.

Père Rossignol and the turnkey were at first in such a state of terror

and prostration that neither the mayor nor the police commissioner could

get anything out of them. Fortunately the latter bethought him of the

idea of giving them each a glass of wine, which enabled the former to

relate how six masked men had forced an entrance into the prison, had

compelled him and the turnkey Rigobert to go down to the cell with them,

and after making sure of the prisoner, who had arrived two days before,

had locked them up in his place. Since then they did not know what had

happened.

This was all that Diane cared to know for the moment. Convinced that her

brother had been taken away by the Companions of Jehu, since Père

Rossignol described his assailants as masked men, she hastened from the

jail. But she was at once surrounded by an eager crowd, who, having

heard that she was the prisoner's sister, wanted to hear the details of

his escape.

In a few words Diane told them all she knew, and with great difficulty

she rejoined Master René Servet. She was about to give him the order for

post-horses to start at once when she heard a man shout that the

registry was on fire--a piece of news destined to share the attention of

the crowd with that of the prisoner's escape.

Indeed, they had learned almost all that was to be learned, when this

unexpected news opened up a new field of conjecture. It was almost

certain that there must be some connection between the prisoner's escape

and the fire at the registry. The young girl believed this to be the

case. The order to put horses to the chaise died upon her lips, for she

felt that this fire would furnish her with further details concerning

her brother's escape which might be useful to her.

Time had been speeding on during this investigation. It was now eight

o'clock in the morning. This was the time to present herself at the

magistrate's house to whom she had the letter. Moreover, the

extraordinary events of which the little town of Nantua had been the

scene would explain this early visit, especially from the prisoner's

sister. Diane, therefore, begged her landlord to take her to Monsieur

Pérignon; for such was the name of the president of the tribunal.

Monsieur Pérignon had been one of the first to be awakened by the news

which had thrown all Nantua into a turmoil. But he had hurried to the

spot in which he, as a judge, was particularly interested; that is to

say, to the registry. He had just returned when Mademoiselle de Fargas

was announced.

When he reached the office the fire had been extinguished; but it had

already consumed a portion of the papers which had been deposited there

for safe-keeping. He had questioned the porter, who told him that the

clerk had come to the office about half-past eleven with two gentlemen,

and that he, the porter, had not thought it necessary to investigate,

inasmuch as the clerk frequently came there in the evening to procure

papers which he engrossed at home.

Scarcely had the clerk taken his departure when he had noticed a bright

light through the windows of the office. Not understanding what it could

mean, he had risen and gone in. There he had found a great fire, lighted

in such a way that it would spread along the wooden cases which lined

the wall, and which contained boxes of documents. He had not lost his

head, but had separated the burning papers from the ones which the fire

had as yet left untouched, and had succeeded in extinguishing it by

bringing water in dippers from a tub in the cellar.

The worthy porter had gone no further in his calculations than to

ascribe it to an accident; but as the flames had done some mischief, and

he, by his presence of mind, had prevented still greater damage, he had

told everybody about it in the morning when he awoke. As it was to his

interest to enlarge upon the occurrence, by seven in the morning the

rumor was current throughout the town that, had it not been for his

great courage, the fire, which had burned his clothes off of his back,

would have destroyed not only the registry but also the entire court

house.

Monsieur Pérignon, on seeing the state of the registry office, had

thought very sensibly that the best way to obtain information was to see

the clerk himself. Consequently, he went to his house and asked to see

him. He was told that during the night the clerk had been attacked with

brain fever, and raved continuously of masked men, stolen papers, and

burning records.

When he saw Monsieur Pérignon, the clerk's terror reached its climax;

but believing that it would be wiser to tell all than to invent a fable

that would only serve to make him suspected of complicity with the

incendiaries, he fell at Monsieur Pérignon's feet and confessed all. The

coincidence between the events of the night left no doubt in the

magistrate's mind that they were a part of the same plot, and were

intended to achieve the double purpose of carrying off both the guilty

man and the proof of his guilt.

The presence of the prisoner's sister in his house, and her story of

what had passed, left no room for doubt, even had he been in doubt.

These masked men had come to Nantua with the intention of abducting

Lucien de Fargas and the report of the prosecution, which had begun

against him. Now for what purpose had the prisoner been abducted?

In the sincerity of her heart Diane did not doubt that her brother's

companions, moved by generosity, had united, and had risked their own

heads to save his.

But Monsieur Pérignon, whose mind was cold and logical, was not of the

same opinion. He knew the actual reason for the prisoner's removal to

Nantua; and that, having informed against some of his accomplices, he

had since become an object of vengeance to the Companions of Jehu. Thus

his opinion inclined him to the belief that, far from aiding him to

escape from prison in order to restore his liberty, they had taken him

away only to punish him more cruelly than the law would have done. The

important thing, therefore, was to ascertain whether they had taken the

road to Geneva or had returned to the interior of the department.

If they had taken the road to Geneva, thereby placing themselves beyond

the frontier, it would prove that they had intended to save Lucien de

Fargas and their own lives as well. If they had, on the contrary, gone

into the interior of the department, it would be because they felt

themselves strong enough to defy justice twice over--not only as

highwaymen but as murderers.

At this suggestion, which came to her for the first time, Diane turned,

and seizing Monsieur Pérignon's hand, cried: "Monsieur, monsieur! do you

think they would dare commit such a crime?"

"The Companions of Jehu would dare anything, mademoiselle," replied the

judge; "particularly that which one would suppose a crime they would not

dare attempt."

"But," said Diane, trembling with terror, "how can we learn whether they

have gone to the frontier or returned to the interior of France?"

"Oh! as to that, nothing is easier," replied the judge. "This is

market-day, and ever since midnight the roads have been crowded with

peasants who have been bringing their produce to market with their carts

and donkeys. Ten men on horseback, accompanied by a prisoner, could

never have passed unnoticed. We must find some people coming from

Saint-Germain and Chérizy, and ask them if they saw such a party going

in the direction of the Gex country; and then we must find others who

come from Vollognas and Peyriat, and find out whether they have seen a

party of horsemen going toward Bourg."

Diane was so urgent, she laid so much stress upon the letter which

Monsieur Pérignon's brother-in-law had given her to him, and, moreover,

her situation as the sister of the man whose life was at stake aroused

so much sympathy, that the magistrate consented to accompany her to the

market-place.

There they learned that some horsemen had been seen on their way to

Bourg.

Diane thanked Monsieur Pérignon, went to the Dauphin, ordered horses to

be made ready, and started immediately for Bourg. There she alighted on

the Place de la Prefecture, at the Hôtel des Grottes de Ceyzeriat, which

had been recommended to her by Master René Servet.

CHAPTER VIII

A NEW COMPANION IS RECEIVED INTO THE SOCIETY OF JEHU UNDER THE NAME OF

ALCIBIADES

Day was breaking when Lucien de Fargas suffered the penalty to which he

had condemned himself, when, on entering the Society of Jehu, he had

sworn on his life never to betray his companions. It was impossible, on

that day at least, to expose his body publicly as proposed. Its removal

to the Place de la Prefecture at Bourg was therefore postponed until the

following night.

On leaving the underground vault, Morgan turned to the messenger and

said:

"Sir, you have seen what has just passed, you know with whom you are,

and we have treated you like a brother. If it is your pleasure that we

should prolong this session, and you desire to take leave of us,

fatigued as we are, we will acquiesce and give you your liberty

unconditionally. If, however, you do not intend to leave us until night,

and if the affair on which you have come is of great importance, grant

us a few hours' sleep. Take some rest yourself, for you do not seem to

have slept any more than we have. At noon, if you will remain so long,

the council will hear you; and if my memory does not play me false,

after having parted at our last meeting as companions-in-arms, we will

part this time as friends."

"Gentlemen," said the messenger, "I was with you in heart long before I

set foot in your domains. The oath which I shall take can add nothing, I

trust, to the confidence which you have already reposed in me. At noon,

if you please, I will present my letters of introduction to you."