In the Reign of Terror Part 15

"Agreed!" the man said, shaking Harry by the hand. "You speak like a man of heart. I will look after him. You need be under no uneasiness. Should any of my comrades come in I shall say: 'this is a young workman who got knocked down and hurt in the crowd, and whom, having nothing better to do, I have brought in here."'

"If he should recover his senses before I come back," Harry said, "please do not let him know it was I who struck him. He will be well-nigh heart-broken that he could not share the fate of his father. Let him think that he was knocked down by some one in the crowd."

"All right! That is easily managed," the man said. "Jacques Medart is no fool. Now you had best be off, for I see you are on thorns, and leave me to bathe his head. If you shouldn't come back you can depend upon it I will look after him till he is able to go about again."

CHAPTER VIII

Marie Arrested

On leaving Victor in the care of the man who had so providentially came to his aid, Harry hurried down the street towards the Abbaye, then he stopped to think--should he return there or make his way to the Bicetre. He could not tell whether his friends had, like the Duc de Gisons, been removed to the Abbaye. If they had been so, it was clearly impossible for him to aid them in any way. They might already have fallen. The crowd was too great for him to regain the gallery, and even there could only witness, without power to avert, their murder. Were they still at the Bicetre he might do something. Perhaps the a.s.sa.s.sins had not yet arrived there.

It was now nine o'clock in the evening. The streets were almost deserted. The respectable inhabitants all remained within their houses, trembling at the horrors, of which reports had circulated during the afternoon. At first there had been hopes that the a.s.sembly would take steps to put a stop to the ma.s.sacre, but the a.s.sembly did nothing. Danton and the ministers were absent. The cannon's roar and the tocsin sounded perpetually. There was no secret as to what was going on. The Commune had the insolence to send commissioners to the bar of the a.s.sembly to state that the people wished to break open the doors of the prisons, and this when two hundred priests had already been butchered at the Carmelites.

A deputation indeed went to the Abbaye to try to persuade the murderers to desist; but their voices were drowned in the tumultuous cries.

The Commune of Paris openly directed the ma.s.sacre. Billaud-Varennes went backwards and forwards to superintend the execution of his orders, and promised the executioners twenty-four francs a day.

The receipt for the payment of this blood-money still exists.

On arriving in front of the Bicetre Harry found all was silent there, and with a faint feeling of hope that the ma.s.sacre would not extend beyond the Abbaye, he again turned his steps in that direction.

The b.l.o.o.d.y work was still going on, and Harry wandered away into the quiet streets to avoid hearing the shrieks of the victims and the yells of the crowd. A sudden thought struck him, and he went along until he saw a woman come out of a house. He ran up to her.

"Madam," he said, "I have the most urgent need of a bonnet and shawl. Will you sell me those you have on? The shops are all shut, or I would not trouble you. You have only to name your price, and I will pay you."

The woman was surprised at this proposition, but seeing that a good bargain was to be made she asked twice the cost of the articles when new, and this Harry paid her without question.

Wrapping the shawl and bonnet into a bundle, he retraced his steps, and sat down on some doorsteps within a distance of the Abbaye which would enable him to observe any general movement of the crowd in front of the prison. At one o'clock in the morning there was a stir, and the body of men with pikes moved down the street.

"They are going to La Force," he said, after following them for some distance. "Oh, if I had but two or three hundred English soldiers here we would make mincemeat of these murderers!"

Harry did not enter La Force, where the scenes that were taking place at the Abbaye--for, in spite of the speed with which the mock trials were hurried through, these ma.s.sacres were not yet finished there, so great was the number of prisoners--were repeated.

At La Force many ladies were imprisoned, among them the Princess de Lamballe. They shared the fate of the male prisoners, being hewn to pieces by sabres. The head of the princess was cut off and stuck upon a pike, and was carried in triumph under the windows of the Temple, where the king and queen were confined, and was held up to the bars of the room they occupied for them to see. Marie Antoinette, fearless for herself, fainted at the terrible sight of the pale head of her friend.

Harry remained at a little distance from La Force, tramping restlessly up and down, half-mad with rage and horror, and at his powerlessness to interfere in any way with the proceedings of the wretches who were carrying on the work of murder. At last, about eight o'clock in the morning, a boy ran by.

"They have finished with them at the Abbaye," he said with fiendish glee. "They are going from there to the Bicetre."

Harry with difficulty repressed his desire to slay the urchin, and hurried away to reach the prison of Bicetre before the band from the Abbaye arrived there. Unfortunately he came down by a side street upon them when they were within a few hundred yards of the prison.

His great hope was that he might succeed in penetrating with the Ma.r.s.eillais and find the marquise, and aid her in making her way through the mob in the disguise he had purchased.

But here, as at the other prisons, there was a method in the work of murder. The agents of the Commune took possession of the hall at the entrance and permitted none to pa.s.s farther into the prison, the warders and officials bringing down the prisoners in batches, and so handing them over for slaughter. In vain Harry tried to penetrate into the inner part of the prison. He was roughly repulsed by the men guarding the door; and at last, finding that nothing could be done, he forced his way out again into the open air, and hurrying away for some distance, threw himself on the ground and burst into a pa.s.sion of tears.

After a time he rose and made his way back to the house where he had left Victor de Gisons. He found him in a state of delirium, acting over and over again the scene in the Abbaye, cursing the judge and executioners, and crying out he would die with his father.

"What does the doctor think of him?" he asked the woman who was sitting by Victor's bed.

"He did not say much," the woman replied. "He shook his head, and said there had been a terrible mental shock, and that he could not answer either for his life or reason. There was nothing to do but to be patient, to keep his head bandaged with wet cloths, and to give him water from time to time. Do not be afraid, sir; we will watch over him carefully."

"I would stay here if I could," Harry said; "but I have others I must see about. I have the terrible news to break to some young ladies of the murder of their father and mother."

"Poor things! Poor things!" the woman said, shaking her head. "It is terrible! My husband was telling me what he saw; and a neighbour came in just now and said it was the same thing at all the other prisons. The priest, too--our priest at the little church at the corner of the street, where I used to go in every morning to pray on my way to market--he was dragged away ten days ago to the Carmelites, and now he is a saint in heaven. How is it, sir, that G.o.d allows such things to be?"

"We cannot tell," Harry said sadly. "As for myself, I can hardly believe it, though I saw it. They say there are over four thousand people in the prisons, and they will all be murdered. Such a thing was never heard of. I can hardly believe that I am not in a dream now."

"You look almost like one dead yourself," the woman said pityingly.

"I have made a bouillon for Jacques' breakfast and mine. It is just ready. Do take a mouthful before you go out. That and a piece of bread and a cup of red wine will do you good."

Harry was on the point of refusing; but he felt that he was utterly worn and exhausted, and that he must keep up his strength. Her husband, therefore, took her place by Victor's bedside in readiness to hold him down should he try to get up in his ravings, while the good woman ladled out a basin of the broth and placed it with a piece of bread and some wine on the table. Harry forced himself to drink it, and when he rose from the table he already felt the benefit of the meal.

"Thank you very much," he said. "I feel stronger now; but how I am to tell the story I do not know. But I must make quite certain before I go to these poor girls that their parents were killed.

Three or four were spared at the Abbaye. Possibly it may have been the same thing at the Bicetre."

So Harry went back and waited outside the prison until the b.l.o.o.d.y work was over; but found on questioning those who came out when all was done that the thirst for blood had increased with killing, and that all the prisoners found in the Bicetre had been put to death.

"Ma foi!" the man whom he was speaking to said; "but these accursed aristocrats have courage. Men and women were alike; there was not one of them but faced the judges bravely and went to their death as calmly as if to dinner. There was a marquis and his wife--the Marquis de St. Caux they called him. They brought them out together.

They were asked whether they had anything to say why they should not be punished for their crimes against France. The marquis laughed aloud.

"'Crimes!' he said. 'Do you think a Marquis de St. Caux is going to plead for his life to a band of murderers and a.s.sa.s.sins? Come, my love.'

"He just gave her one kiss, and then took her hand as if they were going to walk a minuet together, and then led her down between the lines of guards with his head erect and a smile of scorn on his face. She did not smile, but her step never faltered. I watched her closely. She was very pale, and she did not look proud, but she walked as calmly and steadily as her husband till they reached the door where the pikemen were awaiting them, and then it was over in a minute, and they died without a cry or a groan. They are wretches, the aristocrats. They have fattened on the life-blood of the people; but they know how to die, these people."

Without a word Harry turned away. He had told himself there was no hope; but he knew by the bitter pang he felt now that he had hoped to the last. Then he walked slowly away to tell the news.

There were comparatively few people about the streets, and these all of the lower order. Every shop was closed. Men with scared faces stood at some of the doors to gather the news from pa.s.sers-by, and pale women looked timidly from the upper windows. When he reached the house he could not summon courage to enter it, but stood for a long time outside, until at last he saw Louise Moulin put her head from the window. He succeeded in catching her eye, and placing his finger on his lips signed to her to come down. A minute later she appeared at the door.

"Is it all true, Monsieur Sandwith? They say they are murdering the prisoners. Surely it must be false! They could never do such a thing!"

"It is true, Louise. I have seen it myself. I went with a disguise to try and rescue our dear lady, even if I could not save the marquis; but I could not get to her--the wretches have murdered them both."

"Oh, my dear lady!" the old woman cried, bursting into tears. "The pretty babe I nursed. To think of her murdered; and the poor young things upstairs--what shall I do!--what shall I do, Monsieur Sandwith!"

"You must break it to them, Louise. Do they know how great the danger is?"

"No. I have kept it from them. They can see from the window that something unusual is going on; everyone can see that. But I told them it was only that the Prussians were advancing. They are anxious--very anxious--but they are quite unprepared for this."

"Break it gradually, Louise. Tell them first that there are rumours that the prisons have been attacked. Come down again presently as if to get more news, and then tell them that there are reports that the prisoners have been ma.s.sacred, and then at last tell them all the truth."

"But will you not come up, Monsieur Sandwith--they trust you so much? Your presence will be a support to them."

"I could do nothing now," Harry said sadly. "G.o.d only can console them. They had best be by themselves for awhile. I will come in this evening. The first burst of grief will be over then, and my talk may aid them to rouse themselves. Oh, if we had but tried to get them out of prison sooner. And yet who could have foreseen that here in Paris thousands of innocent prisoners, men and women, would be murdered in cold blood!"

Finding that she could not persuade Harry to enter, Louise turned to perform her painful duty; while Harry, thoroughly exhausted with the night of horrors, made his way home, and throwing himself on the bed, fell asleep, and did not wake until evening. His first step was to plunge his head into water, and then, after a good wash, to prepare a meal. His sleep had restored his energy, and with brisk steps he made his way through the streets to Louise Moulin. He knocked with his knuckles at the outer door of her apartments. The old nurse opened it quietly.

"Come in," she said, "and sit down. They are in their room, and I think they have cried themselves to sleep. My heart has been breaking all day to see them. It has been dreadful. Poor little Virginie cried terribly, and sobbed for hours; but it was a long time before the others cried. Marie fainted, and when I got her round lay still and quiet without speaking. Jeanne was worst of all. She sat on that chair with her eyes staring open and her face as white as if she were dead. She did not seem to hear anything I said; but at last, when Virginie's sobs were stopping, I began to talk to her about her mother and her pretty ways when she was a child, and then at last Jeanne broke down, and she cried so wildly that I was frightened, and then Marie cried too; and after a while I persuaded them all to lie down; and as I have not heard a sound for the last hour I hope the good G.o.d has sent them all to sleep."