XVIII
In fact, the news had just come, that the Western Railroad, the lastone that had remained open, was now cut off.
Paris was invested; and so rapid had been the investment, that itcould hardly be believed.
People went in crowds on all the culminating points, the hills ofMontmartre, and the heights of the Trocadero. Telescopes had beenerected there; and every one was anxious to scan the horizon, andlook for the Prussians.
But nothing could be discovered. The distant fields retained theirquiet and smiling aspect under the mild rays of the autumn sun.
So that it really required quite an effort of imagination to realizethe sinister fact, to understand that Paris, with its two millionsof inhabitants, was indeed cut off from the world and separated fromthe rest of France, by an insurmountable circle of steel.
Doubt, and something like a vague hope, could be traced in the toneof the people who met on the streets, saying,
"Well, it's all over: we can't leave any more. Letters, even,cannot pass. No more news, eh?"
But the next day, which was the 19th of September, the mostincredulous were convinced.
For the first time Paris shuddered at the hoarse voice of the cannon,thundering on the heights of Chatillon. The siege of Paris, thatsiege without example in history, had commenced.
The life of the Favorals during these interminable days of anguishand suffering, was that of a hundred thousand other families.
Incorporated in the battalion of his ward, the cashier of the MutualCredit went off two or three times a week, as well as all hisneighbors, to mount guard on the ramparts,--a useless serviceperhaps, but which those that performed it did not look upon as such,--a very arduous service, at any rate, for poor merchants, accustomedto the comforts of their shops, or the quiet of their offices.
To be sure, there was nothing heroic in tramping through the mud,in receiving the rain or the snow upon the back, in sleeping on theground or on dirty straw, in remaining on guard with the thermometertwenty degrees below the freezing-point. But people die of pleurisyquite as certainly as of a Prussian bullet; and many died of it.
Maxence showed himself but rarely at Rue St. Gilles: enlisted in abattalion of sharpshooters, he did duty at the advanced posts. And,as to Mme. Favoral and Mlle. Gilberte, they spent the day trying toget something to live on. Rising before daylight, through rain orsnow, they took their stand before the butcher's stall, and, afterwaiting for hours, received a small slice of horse-meat.
Alone in the evening, by the side of the hearth where a few piecesof green wood smoked without burning, they started at each of thedistant reports of the cannon. At each detonation that shook thewindow-panes, Mme. Favoral thought that it was, perhaps, the onethat had killed her son.
And Mlle. Gilberte was thinking of Marius de Tregars. The accurseddays of November and December had come. There were constant rumorsof bloody battles around Orleans. She imagined Marius, mortallywounded, expiring on the snow, alone, without help, and without afriend to receive his supreme will and his last breath.
One evening the vision was so clear, and the impression so strong,that she started up with a loud cry.
"What is it?" asked Mme. Favoral, alarmed. "What is the matter?"
With a little perspicacity, the worthy woman could easily haveobtained her daughter's secret; for Mlle. Gilberte was not incondition to deny anything. But she contented herself with anexplanation which meant nothing, and had not a suspicion, whenthe girl answered with a forced smile,
"It's nothing, dear mother, nothing but an absurd idea that crossedmy mind."
Strange to say, never had the cashier of the Mutual Credit been forhis family what he was during these months of trials.
During the first weeks of the siege he had been anxious, agitated,nervous; he wandered through the house like a soul in trouble; hehad moments of inconceivable prostration, during which tears couldbe seen rolling down upon his cheeks, and then fits of angerwithout motive.
But each day that elapsed had seemed to bring calm to his soul.Little by little, he had become to his wife so indulgent and soaffectionate, that the poor helot felt her heart touched. He hadfor his daughter attentions which caused her to wonder.
Often, when the weather was fine, he took them out walking, leadingthem along the quays towards a part of the walls occupied by thebattalion of their ward. Twice he took them to St. Onen, where thesharp-shooters were encamped to which Maxence belonged.
Another day he wished to take them to visit M. de Thaller's house,of which he had charge. They refused, and instead of getting angry,as he certainly would have done formerly, he commenced describing tothem the splendors of the apartments, the magnificent furniture, thecarpets and the hangings, the paintings by the great masters, theobjects of arts, the bronzes, in a word, all that dazzling luxuryof which financiers make use, somewhat as hunters do of the mirrorwith which larks are caught.
Of business, nothing was ever said.
He went every morning as far as the office of the Mutual Credit;but, as he said, it was solely as a matter of form. Once in a longwhile, M. Saint Pavin and the younger Jottras paid a visit to theRue St. Gilles. They had suspended,--the one the payments of hisbanking house; the other, the publication of "The Financial Pilot."
But they were not idle for all that; and, in the midst of the publicdistress, they still managed to speculate upon something, no oneknew what, and to realize profits.
They rallied pleasantly the fools who had faith in the defence, andimitated in the most laughable manner the appearance, under theirsoldier's coat, of three or four of their friends who had joinedthe marching battalions. They boasted that they had no privationsto endure, and always knew where to find the fresh butter wherewithto dress the large slices of beef which they possessed the art offinding. Mme. Favoral heard them laugh; and M. Saint Pavin, themanager of "The Financial Pilot," exclaimed,
"Come, come! we would be fools to complain. It is a generalliquidation, without risks and without costs." Their mirth hadsomething revolting in it; for it was now the last and most acuteperiod of the siege.
At the beginning, the greatest optimists hardly thought that Pariscould hold out longer than six weeks. And now the investment hadlasted over four months. The population was reduced to namelessarticles of food. The supply of bread had failed; the wounded, forlack of a little soup, died in the ambulances; old people andchildren perished by the hundred; on the left bank the shells camedown thick and fast, the weather was intensely cold, and there wasno more fuel.
And yet no one complained. From the midst of that population oftwo millions of inhabitants, not one voice rose to beg for theircomfort, their health, their life even, at the cost of acapitulation.
Clear-sighted men had never hoped that Paris alone could compelthe raising of the siege; but they thought, that by holding out,and keeping the Prussians under its walls, Paris would give toFrance time to rise, to organize armies, and to rush upon the enemy.There was the duty of Paris; and Paris was toiling to fulfil it tothe utmost limits of possibility, reckoning as a victory each daythat it gained.
Unfortunately, all this suffering was to be in vain. The fatalhour struck, when, supplies being exhausted, it became necessaryto surrender. During three days the Prussians camped in the ChampsElysees, gazing with longing eyes upon that city, object of theirmost eager desires,--that Paris within which, victorious thoughthey were, they had not dared to venture. Then, soon after,communications were reopened; and one morning, as he received aletter from Switzerland,
"It is from the Baron de Thaller!" exclaimed M. Favoral.
Exactly so. The manager of the Mutual Credit was a prudent man.Pleasantly situated in Switzerland, he was in nowise anxious toreturn to Paris before being quite certain that he had no risksto run.
Upon receiving M. Favoral's assurances to that effect, he started;and, almost at the same time the elder Jottras and M. Costeclarmade their appearance.