THE DEPUTATION.
He sat silent so long, with his eyes on the table, that presently I
grew nettled; wondering what ailed him, and why he did not speak and
say the things that I expected. I had been so confident of the advice
he would give me, that, from the first, I had tinged my story with the
appropriate colour. I had let my bitterness be seen; I had suppressed
no scornful word, but supplied him with all the ground he could desire
for giving me the advice I supposed to be upon his lips.
And yet he did not speak. A hundred times I had heard him declare his
sympathy with the people, his hatred of the corruption, the
selfishness, the abuses of the Government; within the hour I had seen
his eye kindle as he spoke of the fall of the Bastille. It was at his
word I had burned the _carcan_; at his instance I had spent a large
sum in feeding the village during the famine of the past year. Yet
now--now, when I expected him to rise up and bid me do my part, he was
silent!
I had to speak at last. "Well?" I said irritably. "Have you nothing to
say, M. le Cure?" And I moved one of the candles so as to get a better
view of his features. But he still looked down at the table, he still
avoided my eye, his thin face thoughtful, his hand toying with the
crumbs.
At last, "M. le Vicomte," he said softly, "through my mother's mother
I, too, am noble."
I gasped; not at the fact with which I was familiar, but at the
application I thought he intended. "And for that," I said amazed, "you
would----"
He raised his hand to stop me. "No," he said gently, "I would not.
Because, for all that, I am of the people by birth, and of the poor by
my calling. But----"
"But what?" I said peevishly.
Instead of answering me he rose from his seat, and, taking up one of
the candles, turned to the panelled wall behind him, on which hung a
full-length portrait of my father, framed in a curious border of
carved foliage. He read the name below it. "Antoine du Pont, Vicomte
de Saux," he said, as if to himself. "He was a good man, and a friend
to the poor. God keep him."
He lingered a moment, gazing at the grave, handsome face, and
doubtless recalling many things; then he passed, holding the candle
aloft, to another picture which flanked the table: each wall boasted
one. "Adrien du Pont, Vicomte de Saux," he read, "Colonel of the
Regiment Flamande. He was killed, I think, at Minden. Knight of St.
Louis and of the King's Bedchamber. A handsome man, and doubtless a
gallant gentleman. I never knew him."
I answered nothing, but my face began to burn as he passed to a third
picture behind me. "Antoine du Pont, Vicomte de Saux," he read,
holding up the candle, "Marshal and Peer of France, Knight of the
King's Orders, a Colonel of the Household and of the King's Council.
Died of the plague at Genoa in 1710. I think I have heard that he
married a Rohan."
He looked long, then passed to the fourth wall, and stood a moment
quite silent. "And this one?" he said at last. "He, I think, has the
noblest face of all. Antoine, Seigneur du Pont de Saux, of the Order
of St. John of Jerusalem, Preceptor of the French tongue. Died at
Valetta in the year after the Great Siege--of his wounds, some say; of
incredible labours and exertions, say the Order. A Christian soldier."
It was the last picture, and, after gazing at it a moment, he brought
the candle back and set it down with its two fellows on the shining
table; that, with the panelled walls, swallowed up the light, and left
only our faces white and bright, with a halo round them, and darkness
behind them. He bowed to me. "M. le Vicomte," he said at last, in a
voice which shook a little, "you come of a noble stock."
I shrugged my shoulders. "It is known," I said. "And for that?"
"I dare not advise you."
"But the cause is good!" I cried.
"Yes," he answered slowly. "I have been saying so all my life. I dare
not say otherwise now. But--the cause of the people is the people's.
Leave it to the people."
"_You_ say that!" I answered, staring at him, angry and perplexed.
"You, who have told me a hundred times that I am of the people! that
the nobility are of the people; that there are only two things in
France, the King and the people."
He smiled somewhat sadly; tapping on the table with his fingers. "That
was theory," he said. "I try to put it into practice, and my heart
fails me. Because I, too, have a little nobility, M. le Vicomte, and
know what it is."
"I don't understand you," I said in despair. "You blow hot and cold,
M. le Cure. I told you just now that I spoke for the people at the
meeting of the noblesse, and you approved."
"It was nobly done."
"Yet now?"
"I say the same thing," Father Benoit answered, his fine face
illumined with feeling. "It was nobly done. Fight for the people, M.
le Vicomte, but among your fellows. Let your voice be heard there,
where all you will gain for yourself will be obloquy and black looks.
But if it comes, if it has come, to a struggle between your class and
the commons, between the nobility and the vulgar; if the noble must
side with his fellows or take the people's pay, then"--Father Benoit's
voice trembled a little, and his thin white hand tapped softly on the
table--"I would rather see you ranked with your kind."
"Against the people?"
"Yes, against the people," he answered, shrinking a little.
I was astonished. "Why, great heaven," I said, "the smallest
logic----"
"Ah!" he answered, shaking his head sadly, and looking at me with kind
eyes. "There you beat me; logic is against me. Reason, too. The cause
of the people, the cause of reform, of honesty, of cheap grain, of
equal justice, _must_ be a good one. And who forwards it must be in
the right. That is so, M. le Vicomte. Nay, more than that. If the
people are left to fight their battle alone the danger of excesses is
greater. I see that. But instinct does not let me act on the
knowledge."
"Yet, M. de Mirabeau?" I said. "I have heard you call him a great
man."
"It is true," Father Benoit answered, keeping his eyes on mine, while
he drummed softly on the table with his fingers.
"I have heard you speak of him with admiration."
"Often."
"And of M. de Lafayette?"
"Yes."
"And the Lameths?"
M. le Cure nodded.
"Yet all these," I said stubbornly, "all these are nobles--nobles
leading the people!"
"Yes," he said.
"And you do not blame them?"
"No, I do not blame them."
"Nay, you admire them! You admire them, Father," I persisted,
glowering at him.
"I know I do," he said. "I know that I am weak and a fool. Perhaps
worse, M. le Vicomte, in that I have not the courage of my
convictions. But, though I admire those men, though I think them great
and to be admired, I have heard men speak of them who thought
otherwise; and--it may be weak--but I knew you as a boy, and I would
not have men speak so of you. There are things we admire at a
distance," he continued, looking at me a little drolly, to hide the
affection that shone in his eyes, "which we, nevertheless, do not
desire to find in those we love. Odium heaped on a stranger is nothing
to us; on our friends, it were worse than death."
He stopped, his voice trembling; and we were both silent for a while.
Still, I would not let him see how much his words had touched me; and
by-and-by----
"But my father?" I said. "He was strongly on the side of reform!"
"Yes, by the nobles, for the people."
"But the nobles have cast me out!" I answered. "Because I have gone a
yard, I have lost all. Shall I not go two, and win all back?"
"Win all," he said softly--"but lose how much?"
"Yet if the people win? And you say they will?"
"Even then, Tribune of the People," he answered gently, "and an
outcast!"
They were the very words I had applied to myself as I rode; and I
started. With sudden vividness I saw the picture they presented; and I
understood why Father Benoit had hesitated so long in my case. With
the purest intentions and the most upright heart, I could not make
myself other than what I was; I should rise, were my efforts crowned
with success, to a point of splendid isolation; suspected by the
people, whose benefactor I had been, hated and cursed by the nobles
whom I had deserted.
Such a prospect would have been far from deterring some; and others it
might have lured. But I found myself, in this moment of clear vision,
no hero. Old prejudices stirred in the blood, old traditions, born of
centuries of precedence and privilege, awoke in the memory. A shiver
of doubt and mistrust--such as, I suppose, has tormented reformers
from the first, and caused all but the hardiest to flinch--passed
through me, as I gazed across the candles at the Cure. I feared the
people--the unknown. The howl of exultation, that had rent the air in
the Market-place at Cahors, the brutal cries that had hailed Gontaut's
fall, rang again in my ears. I shrank back, as a man shrinks who finds
himself on the brink of an abyss, and through the wavering mist,
parted for a brief instant by the wind, sees the cruel rocks and
jagged points that wait for him below.
It was a moment of extraordinary prevision, and though it passed, and
speedily left me conscious once more of the silent room and the good
Cure--who affected to be snuffing one of the long candles--the effect
it produced on my mind continued. After Father Benoit had taken his
leave, and the house was closed, I walked for an hour up and down the
walnut avenue; now standing to gaze between the open iron gates that
gave upon the road; now turning my back on them, and staring at the
grey, gaunt, steep-roofed house with its flanking tower and round
_tourelles_.
Henceforth, I made up my mind, I would stand aside. I would welcome
reform, I would do in private what I could to forward it; but I would
not a second time set myself against my fellows. I had had the courage
of my opinions. Henceforth, no man could say that I had hidden them,
but after this I would stand aside and watch the course of events.
A cock crowed at the rear of the house--untimely; and across the
hushed fields, through the dusk, came the barking of a distant dog. As
I stood listening, while the solemn stars gazed down, the slight which
St. Alais had put upon me dwindled--dwindled to its true dimensions. I
thought of Mademoiselle Denise, of the bride I had lost, with a faint
regret that was almost amusement. What would she think of this sudden
rupture? I wondered. Of this strange loss of her _fiance?_ Would it
awaken her curiosity, her interest? Or would she, fresh from her
convent school, think that things in the world went commonly so--that
_fiances_ came and passed, and receptions found their natural end in
riot?
I laughed softly, pleased that I had made up my mind. But, had I
known, as I listened to the rustling of the poplars in the road, and
the sounds that came out of the darkened world beyond them, what was
passing there--had I known that, I should have felt even greater
satisfaction. For this was Wednesday, the 22nd of July; and that night
Paris still palpitated after viewing strange things. For the first
time she had heard the horrid cry, "_A la lanterne!_" and seen a man,
old and white-headed, hanged, and tortured, until death freed him. She
had seen another, the very Intendant of the City, flung down, trampled
and torn to pieces in his own streets--publicly, in full day, in the
presence of thousands. She had seen these things, trembling; and other
things also--things that had made the cheeks of reformers grow pale,
and betrayed to all thinking men that below Lafayette, below Bailly,
below the Municipality and the Electoral Committee, roared and seethed
the awakened forces of the Faubourgs, of St. Antoine, and St. Marceau!
What could be expected, what was to be expected, but that such
outrages, remaining unpunished, should spread? Within a week the
provinces followed the lead of Paris. Already, on the 21st the mob of
Strasbourg had sacked the Hotel de Ville and destroyed the Archives;
and during the same week, the Bastilles at Bordeaux and Caen were
taken and destroyed. At Rouen, at Rennes, at Lyons, at St. Malo, were
great riots, with fighting; and nearer Paris, at Poissy, and St.
Germain, the populace hung the millers. But, as far as Cahors was
concerned, it was not until the astonishing tidings of the King's
surrender reached us, a few days later--tidings that on the 17th of
July he had entered insurgent Paris, and tamely acquiesced in the
destruction of the Bastille--it was not until that news reached us,
and hard on its heels a rumour of the second rising on the 22nd, and
the slaughter of Foulon and Berthier--it was not until then, I say,
that the country round us began to be moved. Father Benoit, with a
face of astonishment and doubt, brought me the tidings, and we walked
on the terrace discussing it. Probably reports, containing more or
less of the truth, had reached the city before, and, giving men
something else to think of, had saved me from challenge or
molestation. But, in the country where I had spent the week in moody
unrest, and not unfrequently reversing in the morning the decision at
which I had arrived in the night, I had heard nothing until the Cure
came--I think on the morning of the 29th of July.
"And what do you think now?" I said thoughtfully, when I had listened
to his tale.
"Only what I did before," he answered stoutly. "It has come. Without
money, and therefore without soldiers who will fight, with a starving
people, with men's minds full of theories and abstractions, that all
tend towards change, what can a Government do?"
"Apparently it can cease to govern," I said tartly; "and that is not
what any one wants."
"There must be a period of unrest," he replied, but less confidently.
"The forces of order, however, the forces of the law have always
triumphed. I don't doubt that they will again."
"After a period of unrest?"
"Yes," he answered. "After a period of unrest. And, I confess, I wish
that we were through that. But we must be of good heart, M. le
Vicomte. We must trust the people; we must confide in their good
sense, their capacity for government, their moderation----"
I had to interrupt him. "What is it, Gil?" I said with a gesture of
apology. The servant had come out of the house and was waiting to
speak to me.
"M. Doury, M. le Vicomte, from Cahors," he answered.
"The inn-keeper?"
"Yes, Monsieur; and Buton. They ask to see you."
"Together?" I said. It seemed a strange conjunction.
"Yes, Monsieur."
"Well, show them here," answered, after consulting my companion's
face. "But Doury? I paid my bill. What can he want?"
"We shall see," Father Benoit answered, his eyes on the door. "Here
they come. Ah! Now, M. le Vicomte," he continued in a lower tone, "I
feel less confident."
I suppose he guessed something akin to the truth; but for my part I
was completely at a loss. The innkeeper, a sleek, complaisant man, of
whom, though I had known him some years, I had never seen much beyond
the crown of his head, nor ever thought of him as apart from his
guests and his ordinary, wore, as he advanced, a strange motley of
dignity and subservience; now strutting with pursed lips, and an air
of extreme importance, and now stooping to bow in a shame-faced and
half-hearted manner. His costume was as great a surprise as his
appearance, for, instead of his citizen's suit of black, he sported a
blue coat with gold buttons, and a canary waistcoat, and he carried a
gold-headed cane; sober splendours, which, nevertheless, paled before
two large bunches of ribbons, white, red, and blue, which he wore, one
on his breast, and one in his hat.
His companion, who followed a foot or two behind, his giant frame and
sun-burned face setting off the citizen's plumpness, was similarly
bedizened. But though be-ribboned and in strange company, he was still
Baton, the smith. His face reddened as he met my eyes, and he shielded
himself as well as he could behind Doury's form.
"Good-morning, Doury," I said. I could have laughed at the awkward
complaisance of the man's manner, if something in the gravity of the
Cure's face had not restrained me. "What brings you to Saux?" I
continued. "And what can I do for you?"
"If it please you, M. le Vicomte," he began. Then he paused, and
straightening himself--for habit had bent his back--he continued
abruptly, "Public business, Monsieur, with you on it."
"With me?' I said, amazed. On public business?"
He smiled in a sickly way, but stuck to his text. "Even so, Monsieur,"
he said. "There are such great changes, and--and so great need of
advice."
"That I ought not to wonder at M. Doury seeking it at Saux?"
"Even so, Monsieur."
I did not try to hide my contempt and amusement; but shrugged my
shoulders, and looked at the Cure.
"Well," I said, after a moment of silence, "and what is it? Have you
been selling bad wine? Or do you want the number of courses limited by
Act of the States General? Or----"
"Monsieur," he said, drawing himself up with an attempt at dignity,
"this is no time for jesting. In the present crisis inn-keepers have
as much at stake as, with reverence, the noblesse; and deserted by
those who should lead them----"
"What, the inn-keepers?" I cried.
He grew as red as a beetroot. "M. le Vicomte understands that I mean
the people," he said stiffly. "Who deserted, I say, by their natural
leaders----"
"For instance?"
"M. le Duc d'Artois, M. le Prince de Conde, M. le Duc de Polignac,
M.----"
"Bah!" I said. "How have they deserted?"
"_Pardieu_, Monsieur! Have you not heard?"
"Have I not heard what?"
"That they have left France? That on the night of the 17th, three days
after the capture of the Bastille, the princes of the blood left
France by stealth, and----"
"Impossible!" I said. "Impossible! Why should they leave?"
"That is the very question, M. le Vicomte," he answered, with eager
forwardness, "that is being asked. Some say that they thought to
punish Paris by withdrawing from it. Some that they did it to show
their disapproval of his most gracious Majesty's amnesty, which was
announced on that day. Some that they stand in fear. Some even that
they anticipated Foulon's fate----"
"Fool!" I cried, stopping him sternly--for I found this too much for
my stomach--"you rave! Go back to your menus and your bouillis! What
do you know about State affairs? Why, in my grandfather's time," I
continued wrathfully, "if you had spoken of princes of the blood after
that fashion, you would have tasted bread and water for six months,
and been lucky had you got off unwhipped!"
He quailed before me, and forgetting his new part in old habits,
muttered an apology. He had not meant to give offence, he said. He had
not understood. Nevertheless, I was preparing to read him a lesson
when, to my astonishment, Buton intervened.
"But, Monsieur, that is thirty years back," he said doggedly.
"What, villain?" I exclaimed, almost breathless with astonishment,
"what do you in this _galere?_"
"I am with him," he answered, indicating his companion by a sullen
gesture.
"On State business?"
"Yes, Monsieur."
"Why, _mon Dieu_," I cried, staring at them between amusement and
incredulity, "if this is true, why did you not bring the watch-dog as
well! And Farmer Jean's ram? And the good-wife's cat? And M. Doury's
turnspit? And----"
M. le Cure touched my arm. "Perhaps you had better hear what they have
to say," he observed softly. "Afterwards, M. le Vicomte----"
I nodded sulkily. "What is it, then?" I said. "Ask what you want to
ask."
"The Intendant has fled," Doury answered, recovering something of his
lost dignity, "and we are forming, in pursuance of advice received
from Paris, and following the glorious example of that city, a
Committee; a Committee to administer the affairs of the district. From
that Committee, I, Monsieur, with my good friend here, have the honour
to be a deputation."
"With him?" I said, unable to control myself longer. "But, in heaven's
name, what has he to do with the Committee? Or the affairs of the
district?"
And I pointed with relentless finger at Buton, who reddened under his
tan, and moved his huge feet uneasily, but did not speak.
"He is a member of it," the inn-keeper answered, regarding his
colleague with a side glance, which seemed to express anything but
liking. "This Committee, to be as perfect as possible, Monsieur le
Vicomte will understand, must represent all classes."
"Even mine, I suppose," I said, with a sneer.
"It is on that business we have come," he answered awkwardly. "To ask,
in a word, M. le Vicomte, that you will allow yourself to be elected a
member, and not only a member----
"What elevation!"
"But President of the Committee."
After all--it was no more than I had been foreseeing! It had come
suddenly, but in the main it was only that in sober fact which I had
foreseen in a dream. Styled the mandate of the people, it had sounded
well; by the mouth of Doury, the inn-keeper, Buton assessor, it jarred
every nerve in me. I say, it should not have surprised me; while such
things were happening in the world, with a King who stood by and saw
his fortress taken, and his servants killed, and pardoned the rebels;
with an Intendant of Paris slaughtered in his own streets; with
rumours and riots in every province, and flying princes, and swinging
millers, there was really nothing wonderful in the invitation. And
now, looking back, I find nothing surprising in it. I have lived to
see men of the same trade as Doury, stand by the throne, glittering in
stars and orders; and a smith born in the forge sit down to dine with
Emperors. But that July day on the terrace at Saux, the offer seemed
of all farces the wildest, and of all impertinences the most absurd.
"Thanks, Monsieur," I said, at last, when I had sufficiently recovered
from my astonishment. "If I understand you rightly, you ask me to sit
on the same Committee with that man?" And I pointed grimly to Buton.
"With the peasant born on my land, and subject yesterday to my
justice? With the serf whom my fathers freed? With the workman living
on my wages?"
Doury glanced at his colleague. "Well, M. le Vicomte," he said, with a
cough, "to be perfect, you understand, a Committee must represent
all."
"A Committee!" I retorted, unable to repress my scorn. "It is a new
thing in France. And what is the perfect Committee to do?"
Doury on a sudden recovered himself, and swelled with importance. "The
Intendant has fled," he said, "and people no longer trust the
magistrates. There are rumours of brigands, too; and corn is required.
With all this the Committee must deal. It must take measures to keep
the peace, to supply the city, to satisfy the soldiers, to hold
meetings, and consider future steps. Besides, M. le Vicomte," he
continued, puffing out his cheeks, "it will correspond with Paris; it
will administer the law; it will----"
"In a word," I said quietly, "it will govern. The King, I suppose,
having abdicated."
Doury shrank bodily, and even lost some of his colour. "God forbid!"
he said, in a whining tone. "It will do all in his Majesty's name."
"And by his authority?"
The inn-keeper stared at me, startled and nonplussed; and muttered
something about the people.
"Ah!" I said. "It is the people who invite me to govern, then, is it?
With an inn-keeper and a peasant? And other inn-keepers and peasants,
I suppose? To govern! To usurp his Majesty's functions? To supersede
his magistrates; to bribe his forces? In a word, friend Doury," I
continued suavely, "to commit treason. Treason, you understand?"
The inn-keeper did; and he wiped his forehead with a shaking hand, and
stood, scared and speechless, looking at me piteously. A second time
the blacksmith took it on himself to answer.
"Monseigneur," he muttered, drawing his great black hand across his
beard.
"Buton," I answered suavely, "permit me. For a man who aspires to
govern the country, you are too respectful."
"You have omitted one thing it is for the Committee to do," the smith
answered hoarsely, looking--like a timid, yet sullen, dog--anywhere
but in my face.
"And that is?"
"To protect the Seigneurs."
I stared at him, between anger and surprise. This was a new light.
After a pause, "From whom?" I said curtly.
"Their people," he answered.
"Their Butons," I said. "I see. We are to be burned in our beds, are
we?"
He stood sulkily silent.
"Thank you, Buton," I said. "And that is your return for a winter's
corn. Thanks! In this world it is profitable to do good!"
The man reddened through his tan, and on a sudden looked at me for the
first time. "You know that you lie, M. le Vicomte!" he said.
"Lie, sirrah?" I cried.
"Yes, Monsieur," he answered. "You know that I would die for the
seigneur, as much as if the iron collar were round my neck! That
before fire touched the house of Saux it should burn me! That I am my
lord's man, alive and dead. But, Monseigneur," and, as he continued,
he lowered his tone to one of earnestness, striking in a man so rough,
"there are abuses, and there must be an end of them. There are
tyrants, and they must go. There are men and women and children
starving, and there must be an end of that. There is grinding of the
faces of the poor, Monseigneur--not here, but everywhere round us--and
there must be an end of that. And the poor pay taxes and the rich go
free; the poor make the roads, and the rich use them; the poor have no
salt, while the King eats gold. To all these things there is now to be
an end--quietly, if the seigneurs will--but an end. An end,
Monseigneur, though we burn chateaux," he added grimly.