CHAPTER XXIV. IN THE CATHEDRAL.
Night was almost come, as the mutilated body of Goliath was thrown intothe river. The oscillations of the mob had carried into the street,which runs along the left side of the cathedral, the group into whosepower Father d'Aigrigny had fallen. Having succeeded in freeing himselffrom the grasp of the quarryman, but still closely pressed by themultitude that surrounded him, crying, "Death to the poisoner!" heretreated step by step, trying to parry the blows that were dealt him.By presence of mind, address, and courage, recovering at that criticalmoment his old military energy, he had hitherto been able to resist andto remain firm on his feet--knowing, by the example of Goliath, thatto fall was to die. Though he had little hope of being heard to anypurpose, the abbe continued to call for help with all his might.Disputing the ground inch by inch, he manoeuvred so as to draw nearone of the lateral walls of the church, and at length succeeded inensconcing himself in a corner formed by the projection of a buttress,and close by a little door.
This position was rather favorable. Leaning with his back against thewall, Father d'Aigrigny was sheltered from the attacks of a portion ofhis assailants. But the quarryman, wishing to deprive him of this lastchance of safety, rushed upon him, with the intention of dragging himout into the circle where he would have been trampled under foot. Thefear of death gave Father d'Aigrigny extraordinary strength, and he wasable once more to repulse the quarryman, and remain entrenched in thecorner where he had taken refuge. The resistance of the victim redoubledthe rage of the assailants. Cries of murderous import resounded withnew violence. The quarryman again rushed upon Father d'Aigrigny, saying,"Follow me, friends! this lasts too long. Let us make an end of it."
Father d'Aigrigny saw that he was lost. His strength was exhausted,and he felt himself sinking; his legs trembled under him, and a cloudobscured his sight; the howling of the furious mob began to sound dullupon his ear. The effects of violent contusions, received during thestruggle, both on the head and chest, were now very perceptible. Two orthree times, a mixture of blood and foam rose to the lips of the abbe;his position was a desperate one.
"To be slaughtered by these brutes, after escaping death so often inwar!" Such was the thought of Father d'Aigrigny, as the quarryman rushedupon him.
Suddenly, at the very moment when the abbe, yielding to the instinct ofself-preservation, uttered one last call for help, in a heart-piercingvoice, the door against which he leaned opened behind him, and a firmhand caught hold of him, and pulled him into the church. Thanks tothis movement, performed with the rapidity of lightning, the quarryman,thrown forward in his attempt to seize Father d'Aigrigny, could notcheck his progress, and found himself just opposite to the person whohad come, as it were, to take the place of the victim.
The quarryman stopped short, and then fell back a couple of paces, somuch was he amazed at this sudden apparition, and impressed, like therest of the crowd, with a vague feeling of admiration and respectat sight of him who had come so miraculously to the aid of Fatherd'Aigrigny. It was Gabriel. The young missionary remained standing onthe threshold of the door. His long black cassock was half lost inthe shadows of the cathedral; whilst his angelic countenance, with itsborder of long light hair, now pale and agitated by pity and grief, wasillumined by the last faint rays of twilight. This countenance shonewith so divine a beauty, and expressed such touching and tendercompassion, that the crowd felt awed as, with his large blue eyes fullof tears, and his hands clasped together, he exclaimed, in a sonorousvoice: "Have mercy, my brethren! Be humane--be just!"
Recovering from his first feeling of surprise and involuntary emotion,the quarryman advanced a step towards Gabriel, and said to him: "Nomercy for the poisoner! we must have him! Give him up to us, or we goand take him!"
"You cannot think of it, my brethren," answered Gabriel; "the church isa sacred place--a place of refuge for the persecuted."
"We would drag our prisoner from the altar!" answered the quarryman,roughly; "so give him up to us."
"Listen to me, my brethren," said Gabriel, extending his arms towardsthem.
"Down with the shaveling!" cried the quarryman; "let us go in and hunthim up in the church!"
"Yes, yes!" cried the mob, again led away by the violence of thiswretch, "down with the black gown!"
"They are all of a piece!"
"Down with them!"
"Let us do as we did at the archbishop's!"
"Or at Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois!"
"What do our likes care for a church?"
"If the priests defend the poisoners, we'll pitch them into the watertoo!"
"Yes, yes!"
"I'll show you the lead!" cried the quarryman; and followed by Ciboule,and a good number of determined men, he rushed towards Gabriel.
The missionary, who for some moments had watched the increasing furyof the crowd, had foreseen this movement; hastily retreating into thechurch, he succeeded, in spite of the efforts of the assailants, innearly closing the door, and in barricading it by the help of a woodenbar, which he held in such a manner as would enable the door to resistfor a few minutes.
Whilst he thus defended the entrance, Gabriel shouted to Fatherd'Aigrigny: "Fly, father! fly through the vestry! the other doors arefastened."
The Jesuit, overpowered by fatigue, covered with contusions, bathed incold sweat, feeling his strength altogether fail, and too soon fancyinghimself in safety, had sunk, half fainting, into a chair. At thevoice of Gabriel, he rose with difficulty, and, with a trembling step,endeavored to reach the choir, separated from the rest of the church byan iron railing.
"Quick, father!" added Gabriel, in alarm, using every effort to maintainthe door, which was now vigorously assailed. "Make haste! In a fewminutes it will be too late. All alone!" continued the missionary, indespair, "alone, to arrest the progress of these madmen!"
He was indeed alone. At the first outbreak of the attack, three or foursacristans and other members of the establishment were in the church;but, struck with terror, and remembering the sack of the archbishop'spalace, and of Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois, they had immediately takenflight. Some of them had concealed themselves in the organ-loft andothers fled into the vestry, the doors of which they locked after them,thus cutting off the retreat of Gabriel and Father d'Aigrigny. Thelatter, bent double by pain, yet roused by the missionary's portentivewarning, helping himself on by means of the chairs he met with on hispassage, made vain efforts to reach the choir railing. After advancinga few steps, vanquished by his suffering, he staggered and fell upon thepavement, deprived of sense and motion. At the same moment, Gabriel,in spite of the incredible energy with which the desire to save Fatherd'Aigrigny had inspired him, felt the door giving way beneath theformidable pressure from without.
Turning his head, to see if the Jesuit had at least quitted the church,Gabriel, to his great alarm, perceived that he was lying motionless ata few steps from the choir. To abandon the half-broken door, to runto Father d'Aigrigny, to lift him in his arms, and drag him withinthe railing of the choir, was for the young priest an action rapid asthought; for he closed the gate of the choir just at the instant thatthe quarryman and his band, having finished breaking down the door,rushed in a body into the church.
Standing in front of the choir, with his arms crossed upon hisbreast, Gabriel waited calmly and intrepidly for this mob, still moreexasperated by such unexpected resistance.
The door once forced, the assailants rushed in with great violence. Buthardly had they entered the church, than a strange scene took place. Itwas nearly dark; only a few silver lamps shed their pale light roundthe sanctuary, whose far outlines disappeared in the shadow. On suddenlyentering the immense cathedral, dark, silent, and deserted, the mostaudacious were struck with awe, almost with fear in presence of theimposing grandeur of that stony solitude. Outcries and threats died awayon the lips of the most furious. They seemed to dread awaking theechoes of those enormous arches, those black vaults, from which oozed asepulchral dampness, which chilled their brows,
inflamed with anger, andfell upon their shoulders like a mantle of ice.
Religious tradition, routine, habit, the memories of childhood, have somuch influence upon men, that hardly had they entered the church, thanseveral of the quarryman's followers respectfully took off their hats,bowed their bare heads, and walked along cautiously, as if to check thenoise of their footsteps on the sounding stones. Then they exchanged afew words in a low and fearful whisper. Others timidly raised their eyesto the far heights of the topmost arches of that gigantic building,now lost in obscurity, and felt almost frightened to see themselves solittle in the midst of that immensity of darkness. But at the first jokeof the quarryman, who broke this respectful silence, the emotion soonpassed away.
"Blood and thunder!" cried he; "are you fetching breath to sing vespers?If they had wine in the font, well and good!"
These words were received with a burst of savage laughter. "All thistime the villain will escape!" said one.
"And we shall be done," added Ciboule.
"One would think we had cowards here, who are afraid of the sacristans!"cried the quarryman.
"Never!" replied the others in chorus; "we fear nobody."
"Forward!"
"Yes, yes--forward!" was repeated on all sides. And the animation, whichhad been calmed down for a moment, was redoubled in the midst ofrenewed tumult. Some moments after, the eyes of the assailants, becomingaccustomed to the twilight, were able to distinguish in the midst ofthe faint halo shed around by a silver lamp, the imposing countenance ofGabriel, as he stood before the iron railing of the choir.
"The poisoner is here, hid in some corner," cried the quarryman. "Wemust force this parson to give us back the villain."
"He shall answer for him!"
"He took him into the church."
"He shall pay for both, if we do not find the other!"
As the first impression of involuntary respect was effaced from theminds of the crowd, their voices rose the louder, and their faces becamethe more savage and threatening, because they all felt ashamed of theirmomentary hesitation and weakness.
"Yes, yes!" cried many voices, trembling with rage, "we must have thelife of one or the other!"
"Or of both!"
"So much the worse for this priest, if he wants to prevent us fromserving out our poisoner!"
"Death to him! death to him!"
With this burst of ferocious yells, which were fearfully re-echoed fromthe groined arches of the cathedral, the mob, maddened by rage, rushedtowards the choir, at the door of which Gabriel was standing. The youngmissionary, who, when placed on the cross by the savages of the RockyMountains, yet entreated heaven to spare his executioners, had too muchcourage in his heart, too much charity in his soul, not to risk his lifea thousand times over to save Father d'Aigrigny's--the very man who hadbetrayed hire by such cowardly and cruel hypocrisy.