CHAPTER LII
THE SUPREME EXACTITUDE
Whoever passed within the walls of the Conciergerie was counted lost. Ofthe prisons of the Revolution, it was that to which the accused weretransferred from the others on the eve of sentence; and underneath itwas the hall of the pretended court infamous to all time as "theTribunal of Blood." The _fiacre_ containing Germain and the NationalGuards in whose charge Hache placed him, was followed by the mob to thedoors, and at times it appeared as if he would certainly be torn awayand hanged to a lantern rope. In front of the Conciergerie, whose portalwas lit luridly by two torches, a delighted audience of _Sans-culottes_received his approach with clapping.
"Another!" they shouted.
And, as an arrest was brought in from the opposite direction justafterwards, they clapped again and repeated their shout of "Another!"
His guards dragged him into the presence of the concierge, who eyed himfrom his arm-chair with a drunken glance.
"Dungeon," he muttered.
With a banging of bolts and a creaking of doors, two turnkeys led Lecourdown into a region of darkness. The turnkeys, like their chief, weresurly sots. They took him along a low passage where mastiffs whichpatrolled it eyed him, threw back a cell door, thrust him in, anddisappeared with their lanterns.
Shut in by low, dark walls, and a roof and floor of stone, reeking withdamp and filth, the cell, though but twenty feet by ten or twelve, wasalready the habitation of at least a score of persons.
Their features could not be easily discerned, since the only light inthe obscurity was that of a single candle.
"Comrade, the floor is soft," exclaimed one of the group nearest him--aman of one eye lying on a pile of straw. "Let me present you to our_confrere_, the parricide."
"Shut your gob, thief," shouted a voice, and a heavy scuffle ensued.
Germain leaned against the wall to recover his nerves.
The other inmates had been holding a mock revolutionary trial andcondemning one of their number to execution. Some acted the part ofjudges, some of jury-men, two of guards.
The man on trial turned indignantly on the criminals who had firstaccosted Lecour.
"I pray you, Monsieur," said he courteously to the latter, "Do not takethat for your reception here. Those men are the disgrace of the cell.The rest of us have been used to a happier condition. Let us introduceourselves. I am the Baron de Grancey; my friend, the judge president, isthe Count de Bellecour."
Germain's surprise would have been great had he been less in misery. Asit was he was surprised at nothing. Here it was but another stab in hisheart. Unable to answer he sat down on a stone bench.
"Friends, we must change the diversion," Grancey said sympathetically."Perhaps our comrade might feel better over a hand at picquet."
"Ten straws a point!" exclaimed Bellecour. "Dame, it seems to me I knowhis face. Where have I met you, sir?"
"De Lincy, _pardieu_!" Grancey echoed, scrutinising the new-comer'sfeatures. "Friend Germain, this is a sorry place to welcome you, but youwill find it brighter than you think; there are wit, forgetfulness,society, and some happiness, even in the Conciergerie. Wait until youget up to the corridor to-morrow; you will meet enough of your friendsto hold a respectable reception."
Still Germain could not answer. They did not realise his sorrow andembarrassment in the presence of the old friends to whose friendship hefelt he had no right. His head remained bent. Of a sudden the candleflickered out and relieved him of the need of speaking. They withdrewwondering to their pile of straw.
He did not move from the bench where he sat. Soon, except for the heavybreathing of his companions, silence enveloped the place. He becameabsorbed in anxious imaginings.
What had happened when Cyrene and Dominique returned to the house? Whataccidents overtook them at the Hotel de Ville? Where was she? What wereher thoughts at that moment? And what her sufferings? Then a pictureflitted across his consciousness of the early days of their meeting, thelife at Fontainebleau, the charm of old Versailles. At the memory ofthat taste of a beautiful existence, an unearthly, sorrowful, propheticlonging came over him, not for himself but for others, for a clime wherefalsity, grief, change, and pride should be winnowed completely awayfrom loveliness. He dreamt a world to come wherein the poor, thelow-born, the deformed, yes, the debased children of crime itself shouldbecome of strong and perfect forms, of sensitive and rich artisticsense, wealthy as imagination in castles, parks, and solitudes, pureand keen of honour, spiritually sweet of thought, and so live serene forever, for ever, for ever.
As morning grew, a dim light became perceptible from the corridor, andthe prisoners one by one awoke. But Lecour was so weary that he fellasleep on the bench.
His shoulder was roughly shaken. "Stand up," said a turnkey. Germainopened his eyes and staggered to his feet.
"Salute the President of the Commune, you----" Before him was a shortman in carmagnole and sabre, whom the other prisoners eyed withresentment and alarm.
Lecour bowed.
"You have met me before," the stranger said mockingly. "Once in theRoyal hunting grounds of Fontainebleau. It was accidental. Perhaps Ishould not presume on the acquaintance."
Lecour perfectly recalled the visitor to the cave. That face once seencould never be forgotten, and he was overcome by the ominousness of themeeting. However, he recovered enough to answer sternly--
"Take your revenge; my neck is in your power."
"Judgment must be pronounced on you first. Listen to your judgment,Sieur de Lincy, or Repentigny. Inasmuch as, years ago, you hunted bravemen who through you were condemned to death, which they suffered on thewheel; inasmuch as you wickedly murdered the starving peasants of theparishes of Eaux Tranquilles while in the pursuit of liberty; inasmuchas you resisted the sovereign people and sided with the cut-throats ofVersailles, when you participated in the crimes of the Bodyguard;inasmuch as you have been of the party of conspirators against theRevolution, and have plotted with the tyrant Capet and his widow for theCounter-revolution; inasmuch as you are a suspect, inasmuch as you arean _emigre_; inasmuch as you are a rich and an aristocrat; inasmuch asyou, Germain Lecour, son of Francois Xavier Lecour, peasant of Canada,and grandson of a butcher of Paris, did thus oppress the people withoutthe excuse of hereditary illusion, but were a cheat and adventurersprung from their own bosom; inasmuch as in order to do so you havebroken many laws of the land and natural rights of mankind, haveoutraged the sacred names of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, and havebrought, especially upon yourself, the retribution of that Order of theGalley-on-Land, part of which was assembled before you in the cave ofFontainebleau; know now then, for the first time, that through all thesedealings you have been tracked by them in your every movement; that yourmisdeeds were collected, not forgotten; that our vengeance was on yourpath and waited but the time that suited us; that to hundreds unknown toyou it will be a day of feasting to see you die; that they will drinkwine for your blood and eat bread for your flesh, and when your headdrops into the basket, they will regret the days of tyranny for thisonly--that the humanity of these times does not allow of breaking you inturn on the wheel."
"You are frank," returned Germain bitterly.
The Admiral was taken aback. He had counted on more effect for hisharangue.
"I have one more '_inasmuch_,'" said he, with a sting in his tone and agleam in his eye. "Inasmuch as by your imposture you deceived and misleda heart too pure and lofty for such as you to have dared towards----"
This shaft was aimed to strike deep, and so it did. Germain's defiantbearing fell, he dropped his head and groaned.
"Strike him!" roared Grancey. "You must die anyway. Strike, in defaultof a sword to run him through!"
"He dares not!" the Admiral exclaimed to the group of aristocrats. "Youtake him for one of yourselves. You are his dupes like the others."
"You admit this _inasmuch_?" he inquired triumphantly of Lecour.
"It is true, true, true," moaned Germain. "I may not deny it--the
greatest crime of all my crimes."
The Admiral turned with a snort to Lecour's former companions. They wereaghast.
"Had he denied it here are the proofs, absolutely beyond question!" theAdmiral exclaimed, waving the Record, which he held in his hand.
"By the saints! what a conclusion," Bellecour exclaimed, curling hislip. As for Grancey he slowly turned his back, threw himself down on thestraw on his face, and did not move. The Admiral again faced Germain.
"Shall I tell you something?"
Lecour's heart leaped. His eyes bespoke his suspense. Everything thisman had to say seemed of such import that what went before faded for themoment.
"She is here."
"Here? Merciful God! alas, alas, poor Cyrene!"
The Admiral allowed him some moments. Ultimately he said, eyeing himkeenly--
"You love her--would you like to save her?"
"Is there a hope?" Lecour said hoarsely, looking up with bloodshot eyes.
"Certainly, if you will do what I demand."
"Anything God will permit."
"The condition is this. That you make her with your own lips, in mypresence, a confession of your imposture, of which, remember, I besideshold the proofs. Otherwise she dies to-morrow. Are you willing?" And theAdmiral bent eagerly towards him with eyes full of flaming lights.
Lecour's heart stopped. His head flushed to bursting, the shame of yearsovercame him. His assent was expressed by more a groan than a word. Thefrightful thought was that she would repulse him for ever.
Yes, that too must be faced and done with--bitterness of bitterness. Theold dream so marvellously won by deception must be shattered in everypoint. The Eternal Justice said to him: "NO MAN WHO HAS PROFITED BY AWRONG SHALL KEEP ITS FRUITS." Ah, what fruit of fruits, her love!
"It will finish him with her," the Admiral muttered, watching him. ButLecour did not hear. The _Sans-culotte_ President rapped on the irondoor with his boot, a turnkey replied, and in a few minutes four ofthese men appeared with Cyrene. As soon as she saw Germain she claspedher hands to her bosom and uttered a strange cry, a cry full of wildgladness and fierce agony, such as a soul writhing in the flames ofpurgatory might give at a sudden opening of the gates of both heaven andhell, and she sprang forward to press him to her breast.
Not such was the will of the Admiral. As quick as she, he interposedhimself, and standing in front of Germain grasped her arm and said toher firmly--
"This fellow has something to say to you first."
Then, turning to Lecour, who stood with head down and feelings worsethan those of his condemnation to death--
"Speak, butcher's grandson!"
He withdrew a step to allow Germain to face Cyrene.
The condemned man fell upon his knees and broke into sobs.
"Speak, housekeeper's son!" the Admiral cried exultantly.
"You are a devil!" screamed Cyrene to him, and bent down her arms toGermain.
To her bitter surprise the latter shrank back, and seizing her handcovered it with kisses instead.
"No," he sobbed, "no, Madame Baroness; it is all true--I am not yourequal. I am baseborn, an impostor, an adventurer, the son of the peasantand the servant, the grandson of the butcher. I am no de Lincy norRepentigny. My titles were false, my credit stolen, my position came tome by accident, and my defence was one long falsehood. De Lery wasright. In him I wronged a man of honour, and my retribution is thejudgment of God. Forgive me all the awful wrong I have done you. Forgiveme as a creature whose only excuse has been an irresistible worship ofeven your footsteps."
"Stop!" the Admiral cried. "Citizeness, ponder your treatment by thisvarlet, who has deceived you, besmirched your life, and contaminatedyour hand. Another career is yours; leave him to his punishment."
The words of the two men reached her, but their meaning was notcredible. Her lover--her Germain, her knight--a deceiver, an impostor?She could not realise it. Then the truth of the scene rushed over her;its logic became inescapable.
"Oh," she wailed in one long, agonised moan, sobbing and writhing in theintensity of her torture, "how can I bear this?"
"Come," said the Admiral, but she was oblivious to all except the stormof her distress.
"Come," repeated the Admiral, but she heard not.
"Come," repeated he once more impatiently; but her tear-filled eyes werefixed upon Germain. The horror of his falsity was strong within her, buthis chivalry and tenderness throughout their long association could notbe so quickly forgotten, nor the bonds of her affection so instantlyblotted out. The mystery of his long sorrow dawned upon her, and hisutter self-accusation appealed to her pity. Their differences of rankbecame as nothing.
"Come away," said the Admiral again, with soft-uttered persuasiveness.
Cyrene's nature, in those moments, had felt, thought, concluded withlightning swiftness. Her soul swept through a great arc of intuition.
"No, no, there is something I do not understand!" she cried. "MyGermain, God has made you for me. You loved me and were led astray, butyou are honourable and faithful in the sight of heaven, my eternal love.Let us kiss each other. Let us press each other to our breasts and die;in a few hours we shall be together for ever."
Before the Admiral could prevent it they were clasped in a passionate,feverish, last embrace.
"Very well," the Admiral sneered frigidly. "I keep my promises.Apothecary's apprentice, to-day you die. As for you, citizeness, I giveyou your freedom."
"I reject it--I will die with him," she answered.
"Not at all," he returned. "I promised him your liberty. I keep mypromises."
"Wretch! you would separate the betrothed from the dying?"
"Go, beloved," said Germain, releasing her. "It is just that I shoulddie, but not you. I shall love you in the grave. Remember not myerrors."
"No, I will never leave you, Germain. Oh, Germain, I will die withyou."
"Take the woman off!" growled the Admiral to the turnkeys. They obeyedhim instantly.
Germain rushed after them to the door of the cell, but it was closedupon him, and he caught only a shadow through the grating and heard herlast cry of grief.
CHAPTER LIII
RETRIBUTION ACCOMPLISHED
When Cyrene was pushed out of the outer portal of the prison she was metby her good friend the patriot Hugues la Tour.
"Do not despair," said he. "My influence is great; he shall yet besaved."
"Oh, for the love of God, try, citizen," she sobbed. Supporting her hesigned for a _fiacre_ and drove her to his room not far away, where heleft her with the housekeeper, and bidding her trust in him, flew backand obtained an interview with Lecour in his cell. He explained theobject of his visit and the history of his connection with Cyrene.
"And now I am come to return her life for life," he ended.
"But mine is not worth it," Germain answered soberly. "Save hers. Howcan you risk yourself for me? I was once the cause of yourcondemnation."
"What matters that. It was but what was believed right at the time. Inour glorious Revolution we do not think of revenge; we only seek tostrike at the enemies of human rights. You are not really an aristocrat.Plead that before the judges: your liberty will not be hard for me toobtain."
"Noble-hearted man----"
"Take care--the word 'noble' is forbidden."
"You are generous, citizen. My conscience tells me it would be base todo as you urge. After plucking life's blossoms as an aristocrat I mustgrasp the thorns."
Nothing could save him from his determination. He had lived as anaristocrat--it was incumbent on him, he said, not to shirk death as one.
At last la Tour left him and sought for the Admiral. He could not findthe latter until about two o'clock, and then at the prison. Theconcierge said he was in the courtyard and la Tour found him engaged ina singular business.
The women's courtyard was separated by an iron railing some fifteen feetlong from the men's. Here the imprisoned ladies communicated with theirmale friends as gaily as if e
ach were not foredoomed. The Faubourg St.Germain was transferred to the Conciergerie. The toilets were thefreshest and the manners most well-bred in Paris. The guillotine was thesubject of facetious remarks up to the very hour of parting for themockery of the trial below, and at evening vows of love were breathedbetween the bars. La Tour found a crowd on both sides enjoying thecramped promenade. Amid this crowd was a "sheep"--one of those vilespies who acted the part of pretending to be a fellow-prisoner of therest in order that he might entrap them into unguarded expressions anddenounce them.
The _Sans-culottes_ commissioners were selecting their daily list ofvictims at random. In doing so they seized the "sheep." The Admiral waspresent and the "sheep" appealed to him, protesting his occupation. TheAdmiral only laughed at him.
"Correct," said he to the guard, chuckling, and the guard needed nomore. They began to drag the "sheep" away.
The "sheep" was Jude.
"I am yours--you promised me my life," he desperately screamed back. TheAdmiral smiled contemptuously; his eyes were very bright and hard.
"I promised that Repentigny should die first; you afterwards; I grantyou the privilege of going second." The _Sans-culottes_, their noisylaughs resounding through the corridor and echoed by the baying of themastiffs, dragged the spy away.
La Tour could not move the Admiral to any leniency for Germain. Thebandit followed each of his prayers by a sinister silence. At length laTour was compelled by lack of time to give him up and speed to therevolutionary tribunal itself, in session underneath. He was just intime to make his appeal, for Lecour was already brought before the juryand the five judges.
The strenuous efforts of Hugues were nullified by the persistent refusalof the Canadian to take advantage of the device proposed to him, by hiswould-be preserver--of declaring himself a non-aristocrat. La Tourvehemently urged him at least to cry--"_Vive la Republique!_" At thatLecour seemed to conceive an idea, and stepping forward cried instead ina voice of decision--
"Long live the King!"
His sentence was signed immediately.
Sanson's death-carts rolled into the courtyard. The hour for the dailypublic show had arrived. The rest of the prisoners on trial wereperemptorily shoved through the mill of condemnation and all werehustled up to the toilette of the executioner. Hands tied, hair cut,feet bared, half a dozen were pushed up into each cart, seated three ona side, and the carts set out. Seven in the line, the roughest, rudestvehicles in the town, they jerked over the uneven cobbles, rumbledacross the Pont-Neuf, and crept along the Rue de la Monnaie and thenalong the Rue Honore, regardless, both they, their carters, theirexecutioner's men, and their Dragoon escorts, of the agony theyfreighted. The streets themselves wore unfeeling faces. The merchantshad closed their shutters and across the facades of many houses werelarge inscriptions such as, "THE REPUBLIC ONE AND INDIVISIBLE,""LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY, _or Death_." And the sun poured down itsuntempered rays on the condemned. But more pitiless than carts orstreets or sun were the coarse Jacobins who ran alongside.
With what fine wit they shouted--
"Long live the razor of the Republic!"
A newsvendor began to sing, and was joined in chorus--
"Doctor Guillotin, That great _medecin_ Love of human kind Preoccupies his mind."
As to the company of the lost in the carts, they consisted of a strangevariety. In the first, the principal persons were a majestic woman andher two daughters, sitting erect, with hands tied, costumed freshly andinvested still with the old carefulness of manner; but the eyes of theyoungest were staring with horror. There was a large dog in the samecart, condemned for carrying despatches. In the next a NationalAssembly-man, betrayed by Robespierre, tore his hair and raved on hisfate. Opposite him two poor sewing-women, falsely accused by aneighbour, sat helplessly, their eyes shut, their lips incessantlyrepeating prayers; by their side, a boy of eight, with bright, fairfeatures, sobbing, his little hands tied, as the executioner's manshowed the crowd with a laugh. His crime was that his father had been aCount. Third came the cart containing Germain, to whom all eyes weredirected. On the seat opposite him was Jude, frantically entreating thesaints, the driver, the guards, and the crowd to take pity on his soul.
"Buy the bulletin of the revolutionary tribunal; judgements of to-day!The horrible aristocrat Repentigny brought to justice! Here he is! hereis the one who defied the jury!"
"Bodyguard of Capet!"
"Here is the one who killed Bec and Caron!" shrilled Wife Gougeon.
"Long live the Galley-on-Land!"
These cries gradually roused Lecour, and for the first time, putting itall together and recognising faces, he realised the truth of theAdmiral's boast that he had been pursued all these years by the crewabout him--the organisation of the cave of Fontainebleau. The long-lithatred of so many eyes stabbed his heart to the quick. Yet of the inwardPassion of his journey there was no outward appearance. He sat quiet ofvisage, clinging to the one underlying thought that he had been able tofree Cyrene. Alas! how long even yet could it be before she would beriding the same ride?
Suddenly Abbe Jude in front of him lost his frantic gestures and sobbedviolently. Germain put aside his own concerns, and bending overwhispered gently, "Courage, my brother, for a little."
"Admit even now that you are not an aristocrat," cried Hughes frombeside the cart, "and I will move heaven and earth to reprieve you."
But Germain went steadily forward.
The Place de la Revolution, now completely transformed into the Place dela Concorde, that ornament of Paris, was then unpaved and unfinished. Inthe middle stood a plaster statue of Liberty and near it the gauntmachine of fear--a plank platform reached by a narrow stair having asingle handrail, and, pointing out of it towards the sky a pair of tallbeams between which, on touching a spring, the knife fell on the neck ofthe condemned.
From early morning Cyrene had been waiting, racked with fear, at thehouse of la Tour on one of the small streets not far from the Place. Atthe sound of the shouts which showed that an execution had begun, sheflew there and by despairing force crushed her way through thousands ofspectators, towards the guillotine, on whose platform figures couldalready be seen appearing and falling one by one. She moaned and gaspedat each fresh obstacle to her frantic efforts. Her lips were white, hereyes staring.
The patriotesses, who sat knitting on the stand erected near the machinefor their daily delectation, agreed that she was an excellent diversion.
All at once her difficulty in pushing forward ceased and the brutesaround her made way.
"Give her a good place," she heard one cry, and many hands impelled herto the foot of the guillotine. Bloated faces, wicked jests, fistsgrasping pipes and bottles, a tumult of the coarse and passionate,swayed, about her, organised under one being, the Admiral, jeering inhis low power. Never had his head, his face, shown more completely theirresemblance to a skull.
As he stretched up his arm with a gesture of ferocious, gleeful malice,the wretches around the scaffold, as one man, broke into intoxicatedlaughter, joined hands and swayed in and out in the popular dance--
"Hurrah for the sound Of the cannon."
Meanwhile two of his henchmen held Cyrene before him.
"Look!" he cried to her. "See!" and pointed up to the guillotine. Hereyes involuntarily followed.
She saw the flash of the descending blade. Wild and speechless, she hungpetrified on the arms of the two men holding her. But now she wasoblivious of everything except that another head, another form, farabove all else to her, was on the platform. His face was pallid, hisbearing sweet, solemn, and brave.
"Death to the aristocrat!" shouted the excited mob. His lips moved witha brief appearance of words. Had she been closer she would have beardhim say quietly: "It is just."
The executioner Sanson turned from the last victim and seized him. Atthe very instant he felt the grasp he caught sight of the face of hisbeloved, held there in the grasp of the two Jacobins. This was thecrowning agony. The
immensity of his retribution swept over him in anoverwhelming flood.
"Oh God, does Justice require this too?" he cried.
Sanson's sinewy assistants thrust him against an upright plank. In thelast remnants of her congested, distorted vision, Cyrene saw the brightknife fall like a lightning vengeance.
At night in the Cemetery of the Madeleine near by la Tour, searchinganxiously with a lantern, found her lying across the common trench intowhich the bodies and heads of the executed were indiscriminately thrownand hastily covered. There, her arms stretched across as if to embraceas much of it as she could, her wonderful golden majesty of hair strewnupon them, her white complexion still dazzling in its purity, her blueeyes half closed, lay the _fiancee_ of the false Repentigny. Her soulhad flown to be blent with that of him who had suffered his punishment,in the bosom of God, the place of social justice, where all ambitionand all forgiveness melt satisfied and surpassed in Love Divine.
* * * * *
A wave of the Revolution swept out to India. In Mahe, under the eyes ofthe new Golden Dog, Philibert killed the Marquis de Repentigny.
THE END.
UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends