The History of a Crime Part 24

They cried out to me, "The Salle Roysin."

"That is it," said I, "The Salle Roysin. We who remain free number a hundred and twenty Republican Representatives. Let us install ourselves in this hall. Let us install ourselves in the fulness and majesty of the Legislative Power. Henceforward we are the a.s.sembly, the whole of the a.s.sembly! Let us sit there, deliberate there, in our official sashes, in the midst of the People. Let us summon the Faubourg St. Antoine to its duty, let us shelter there the National Representation, let us shelter there the popular sovereignty. Let us intrust the People to the keeping of the People. Let us adjure them to protect themselves. If necessary, let us order them!"

A voice interrupted me: "You cannot give orders to the People!"

"Yes!" I cried, "When it is a question of public safety, of the universal safety, when it is a question of the future of every European nationality, when it is a question of defending the Republic, Liberty, Civilization, the Revolution, we have the right--we, the Representatives of the entire nation--to give, in the name of the French people, orders to the people of Paris! Let us, therefore, meet to-morrow at this Salle Roysin; but at what time? Not too early in the morning. In broad day. It is necessary that the shops should be open, that people should be coming and going, that the population should be moving about, that there should be plenty of people in the streets, that they should see us, that they should recognize us, that the grandeur of our example should strike every eye and stir every heart. Let us all be there between nine and ten o'clock in the morning. If we cannot obtain the Salle Roysin we will take the first church at hand, a stable, a shed, some enclosure where we can deliberate; at need, as Michel de Bourges has said, we will hold our sittings in a square bounded by four barricades. But provisionally I suggest the Salle Roysin. Do not forget that in such a crisis there must be no vacuum before the nation. That alarms it. There must be a government somewhere, and it must be known. The rebellion at the Elysee, the Government at the Faubourg St. Antoine; the Left the Government, the Faubourg St. Antoine the citadel; such are the ideas which from to-morrow we must impress upon the mind of Paris. To the Salle Roysin, then! Thence in the midst of the dauntless throng of workmen of that great district of Paris, enclosed in the Faubourg as in a fortress, being both Legislators and Generals, multiplying and inventing means of defence and of attack, launching Proclamations and unearthing the pavements, employing the women in writing out placards while the men are fighting, we will issue a warrant against Louis Bonaparte, we will issue warrants against his accomplices, we will declare the military chiefs traitors, we will outlaw in a body all the crime and all the criminals, we will summon the citizens to arms, we will recall the army to duty, we will rise up before Louis Bonaparte, terrible as the living Republic, we will fight on the one hand with the power of the Law, and on the other with the power of the People, we will overwhelm this miserable rebel, and will rise up above his head both as a great Lawful Power and a great Revolutionary Power!"

While speaking I became intoxicated with my own ideas. My enthusiasm communicated itself to the meeting. They cheered me. I saw that I was becoming somewhat too hopeful, that I allowed myself to be carried away, and that I carried them away, that I presented to them success as possible, as even easy, at a moment when it was important that no one should entertain an illusion. The truth was gloomy, and it was my duty to tell it. I let silence be re-established, and I signed with my hand that I had a last word to say. I then resumed, lowering my voice,--

"Listen, calculate carefully what you are doing. On one side a hundred thousand men, seventeen harnessed batteries, six thousand cannon-mouths in the forts, magazines, a.r.s.enals, ammunition sufficient to carry out a Russian campaign; on the other a hundred and twenty Representatives, a thousand or twelve hundred patriots, six hundred muskets, two cartridges per man, not a drum to beat to arms, not a bell to sound the tocsin, not a printing office to print a Proclamation; barely here and there a lithographic press, and a cellar where a hand-bill can be hurriedly and furtively printed with the brush; the penalty of death against any one who unearths a paving stone, penalty of death against any one who would enlist in our ranks, penalty of death against any one who is found in a secret meeting, penalty of death against any one who shall post up an appeal to arms; if you are taken during the combat, death; if you are taken after the combat, transportation or exile; on the one side an army and a Crime; on the other a handful of men and Right. Such is this struggle. Do you accept it?"

A unanimous shout answered me, "Yes! yes!"

This shout did not come from the mouths, it came from the souls. Baudin, still seated next to me, pressed my hand in silence.

It was settled therefore at once that they should meet again on the next day, Wednesday, between nine and ten in the morning, at the Salle Roysin, that they should arrive singly or by little separate groups, and that they should let those who were absent know of this rendezvous. This done, there remained nothing more but to separate. It was about midnight.

One of Cournet's scouts entered. "Citizen Representatives," he said, "the regiment is no longer there. The street is free."

The regiment, which had probably come from the Popincourt barracks close at hand, had occupied the street opposite the blind alley for more than half an hour, and then had returned to the barracks. Had they judged the attack inopportune or dangerous at night in that narrow blind alley, and in the centre of this formidable Popincourt district, where the insurrection had so long held its own in June, 1848? It appeared certain that the soldiers had searched several houses in the neighborhood.

According to details which we learned subsequently, we were followed after leaving No. 2, Quai Jemmapes, by an agent of police, who saw us enter the house where a M. Cornet was lodging, and who at once proceeded to the Prefecture to denounce our place of refuge to his chiefs. The regiment sent to arrest us surrounded the house, ransacked it from attic to cellar, found nothing, and went away.

This quasi-synonym of Cornet and Cournet lead misled the bloodhounds of the _coup d'etat_. Chance, we see, had interposed usefully in our affairs.

I was talking at the door with Baudin, and we were making some last arrangements, when a young man with a chestnut beard, dressed like a man of fas.h.i.+on, and possessing all the manners of one, and whom I had noticed while speaking, came up to me.

"Monsieur Victor Hugo," said he, "where are you going to sleep?"

Up to that moment I had not thought of this.

It was far from prudent to go home.

"In truth," I answered, "I have not the least idea."

"Will you come to my house?"

"I shall be very happy."

He told me his mane. It was M. de la R----. He knew my brother Abel's wife and family, the Montferriers, relations of the Chambaceres, and he lived in the Rue Caumartin. He had been a Prefect under the Provisional Government. There was a carriage in waiting. We got in, and as Baudin told me that he would pa.s.s the night at Cournet's, I gave him the address of M. do la R----, so that he could send for me if any notice of the movement came from the Faubourg St. Marceau or elsewhere. But I hoped for nothing more that night, and I was right.

About a quarter of an hour after the separation of the Representatives, and after we had left the Rue Popincourt, Jules Favre, Madier de Montajau, de Flotte, and Carnot, to whom we had sent word to the Rue des Moulins, arrived at Cournet's, accompanied by Schoelcher, by Charamaule, by Aubry (du Nord), and by Bastide. Some Representatives were still remaining at Cournet's. Several, like Baudin, were going to pa.s.s the night there. They told our colleagues what had been settled respecting my proposition, and of the rendezvous at the Salle Roysin; only it appears that there was some doubt regarding the hour agreed upon, and that Baudin in particular did not exactly remember it, and that our colleagues believed that the rendezvous, which had been fixed for nine o'clock in the morning, was fixed for eight.

This alteration in the hour, due to the treachery of memory for which no one can be blamed, prevented the realization of the plan which I had conceived of an a.s.sembly holding its sittings in the Faubourg, and giving battle to Louis Bonaparte, but gave us as a compensation the heroic exploits of the Ste. Marguerite barricade.

CHAPTER XX.

THE BURIAL OF A GREAT ANNIVERSARY

Such was the first day. Let us look at it steadfastly. It deserves it.

It is the anniversary of Austerlitz; the Nephew commemorates the Uncle.

Austerlitz is the most brilliant battle of history; the Nephew set himself this problem--how to commit a baseness equal to this magnificence. He succeeded.

This first day, which will be followed by others, is already complete.

Everything is there. It is the most terrible attempt at a thrust backwards that has ever been essayed. Never has such a crumbling of civilization been seen. All that formed the edifice is now in ruin; the soil is strewn with the fragments. In one night the inviolability of the Law, the Right of the Citizen, the Dignity of the Judge, and the Honor of the Soldier have disappeared. Terrible subst.i.tutions have taken place; there was the oath, there is pergury; there was the flag, there is a rag; there was the Army, there is a band of brigands; there was Justice, there is treason; there was a code of laws, there is the sabre; there was a Government, there is a crew of swindlers; there was France, there is a den of thieves. This called itself Society Saved.

It is the rescue of the traveller by the highwayman.

France was pa.s.sing by, Bonaparte cried, "Stand and deliver!"

The hypocrisy which has preceded the Crime, equals in deformity the impudence which has followed it. The nation was trustful and calm. There was a sudden and cynical shock. History has recorded nothing equal to the Second of December. Here there was no glory, nothing but meanness. No deceptive picture. He could have declared himself honest; He declares himself infamous; nothing more simple. This day, almost unintelligible in its success, has proved that Politics possess their obscene side. Louis Bonaparte has shown himself unmasked.

Yesterday President of the Republic, to-day a scavenger. He has sworn, he still swears: but the tone has changed. The oath has become an imprecation. Yesterday he called himself a maiden, to-day he becomes a brazen woman, and laughs at his dupes. Picture to yourself Joan of Arc confessing herself to be Messalina. Such is the Second of December.

Women are mixed up in this treason. It is an outrage which savors both of the boudoir and of the galleys. There wafts across the fetidness of blood an undefined scent of patchouli. The accomplices of this act of brigandage are most agreeable men--Romieu, Morny. Getting into debt leads one to commit crimes.

Europe was astounded. It was a thunder bolt from a thief. It must be acknowledged that thunder can fall into bad hands, Palmerston, that traitor, approved of it. Old Metternich, a dreamer in his villa at Rennweg, shook his head. As to Soult, the man of Austerlitz after Napoleon, he did what he ought to do, on the very day of the Crime he died, Alas! and Austerlitz also.

THE SECOND DAY--THE STRUGGLE.

CHAPTER I.

THEY COME TO ARREST ME

In order to reach the Rue Caumartin from the Rue Popincourt, all Paris has to be crossed. We found a great apparent calm everywhere. It was one o'clock in the morning when we reached M. de la R----'s house. The _fiacre_ stopped near a grated door, which M. de la R---- opened with a latch-key; on the right, under the archway, a staircase ascended to the first floor of a solitary detached building which M. de la R---- inhabited, and into which he led me.

We entered a little drawing-room very richly furnished, lighted with a night-lamp, and separated from the bedroom by a tapestry curtain two-thirds drown. M. de la R---- went into the bedroom, and a few minutes afterwards came back again, accompanied by a charming woman, pale and fair, in a dressing-gown, her hair down, handsome, fresh, bewildered, gentle nevertheless, and looking at me with that alarm which in a young face confers an additional grace. Madame de la R---- had just been awakened by her husband. She remained a moment on the threshold of her chamber, smiling, half asleep, greatly astonished, somewhat frightened, looking by turns at her husband and at me, never having dreamed perhaps what civil war really meant, and seeing it enter abruptly into her rooms in the middle of the night under this disquieting form of an unknown person who asks for a refuge.

I made Madame de la R---- a thousand apologies, which she received with perfect kindness, and the charming woman profited by the incident to go and caress a pretty little girl of two years old who was sleeping at the end of the room in her cot, and the child whom she kissed caused her to forgive the refugee who had awakened her.

While chatting M. de la R---- lighted a capital fire in the grate, and his wife, with a pillow and cus.h.i.+ons, a hooded cloak belonging to him, and a pelisse belonging to herself, improvised opposite the fire a bed on a sofa, somewhat short, and which we lengthened by means of an arm-chair.

During the deliberation in the Rue Popincourt, at which I had just presided, Baudin had lent me his pencil to jot down some names. I still had this pencil with me. I made use of it to write a letter to my wife, which Madame de la R---- undertook to convey herself to Madame Victor Hugo the next day. While emptying my pockets I found a box for the "Italiens," which I offered to Madame de la R----. On that evening (Tuesday, December 2d) they were to play _Hernani_.

I looked at that cot, these two handsome, happy young people, and at myself, my disordered hair and clothes, my boots covered with mud, gloomy thoughts in my mind, and I felt like an owl in a nest of nightingales.

A few moments afterwards M. and Madame de la R---- had disappeared into their bedroom, and the half-opened curtain was closed. I stretched myself, fully dressed as I was, upon the sofa, and this gentle nest disturbed by me subsided into its graceful silence.

One can sleep on the eve of a battle between two armies, but on the eve of a battle between citizens there can be no sleep. I counted each hour as it sounded from a neighboring church; throughout the night there pa.s.sed down the street, which was beneath the windows of the room where I was lying, carriages which were fleeing from Paris. They succeeded each other rapidly and hurriedly, one might have imagined it was the exit from a ball. Not being able to sleep, I got up. I had slightly parted the muslin curtains of a window, and I tried to look outside; the darkness was complete. No stars, clouds were flying by with the turbulent violence of a winter night. A melancholy wind howled. This wind of clouds resembled the wind of events.