suddenly and soon—but what do I dare expect?
I wouldn’t ask him to act before the time’s ripe, if he aims at a coup. I wouldn’t expect saving my life to be more than an accidental benefit to him. So put that down, on Philippe Fabre’s side: I am, basically, a humble man.
I don’t feel well, the last two or three weeks. They say we’re in for a mild winter. I hope so. I have a terrible cough. I thought of consulting Dr. Souberbielle, but I’m not sure I want to hear his verdict. His medical one, I mean; he’s a juror of the Tribunal, but with that verdict I wouldn’t have a choice.
I’ve no appetite, and I get pains in my chest. Oh well, it may not matter soon.
Danton to the convention, asking for state pensions for priests who have lost their livings:
If a priest is without means of support, what do you expect him to do? He will die, or join the Vendee rebels, or become your irreconcilable enemy … . You have to temper political claims with those of reason and sanity … . There must be no intolerance, no persecution. [Applause]
DANTON: Scuttled Chaumette. I’ll ram his Worship of Reason up—down his throat. We ought to have an end to these anti-religious masquerades. Every day in the Convention we have to listen to a dreary procession of clerics wringing out their souls like laundry, and abjuring their faith takes them as long as a High Mass. There is a limit, and I shall put it to them that the limit has been reached.
CAMILLE: While you were away some sansculottes came in with a skull, they said it was the skull of Saint Denis. They said it was a grisly relic of a superstitious age, and they wanted it off their hands. I’d have had it. I wanted to show it to Saint-Just.
DANTON: Imbeciles.
LOUISE: I wouldn’t have taken Citizen Robespierre for a religious man.
DANTON: He’s not, in your sense. But he doesn’t want to see persecution, and he doesn’t want atheism elevated into a policy. Oh, but there’s one thing he’d like much better than running the Revolution. He’d like to be Pope.
CAMILLE: Vulgarity incarnate! He aims higher.
DANTON: Saint Maximilien?
CAMILLE: He never talks about God anymore, he talks about the Supreme Being. I think I know who that is.
DANTON: Maximilien?
CAMILLE: Right.
DANTON: You’ll get into trouble for laughing at people. Saint-Just says that people who laugh at the heads of governments are suspect.
CAMILLE: What fate is reserved for those who laugh at Saint-Just? The guillotine is too good for them.
Vadier (on Danton): “We’ll clean up the rest of them, and leave that great stuffed turbot till the end.”
Danton (on Vadier): “Vadier? I’ll eat his brains and use his skull to shit in.”
Robespierre to the Jacobin Club: the low-key delivery, the fading pauses that do not relate to sense, have now become a practiced technique, hypnotic in effect:
“Danton, they accuse you of having … emigrated, gone off to Switzerland, laden with the spoils of your … corruption. Some people even say that you were at the head of a conspiracy to enthrone Louis XVII, on the understanding that … you were to be Regent … . Now I … have observed Danton’s political opinions—because we have sometimes disagreed I have observed them closely and at times … with hostility. It is true that … he was slow to suspect … Dumouriez, that he failed to show himself implacable against … Brissot and his accomplices. But if we did not always … see eye-to-eye … must I conclude that he was betraying his country? To the best of my knowledge he had always served it zealously. If Danton is on trial here I am on trial … too. Let all those people who have anything to say against Danton come … forward now. Let them stand up, those who are more … patriotic … than we.”
“If you could spare me a few minutes,” Fouquier-Tinville said. His demeanor certainly suggested he didn’t have much time to waste. “Family feeling, you know.”
“Oh yes?” Lucile said.
Fouquier thought, what a prize she is; far too good for anyone in our family. “May I sit?” he said. “A regrettable incident—”
“What has happened?” she said. And actually, he noticed with amusement, put her lovely hand to her throat.
“No, no—my description was a true one. Nothing has happened to him, in the sense that you fear.”
How would you know, she thought, in what senses I fear? She sat down opposite the Public Prosecutor. “Well then, cousin?”
“You recollect the name of Barnave, my dear? He was a deputy in the National Assembly. He had been in prison for some time. We guillotined him today. He had secret dealings with Antoinette.”
“Yes,” she said. “I knew him. Poor Tiger.”
“Were you aware of your husband’s affection for this traitor?”
She looked up quickly. “Please leave your courtroom manner aside. I’m not in the dock.”
Fouquier threw up his hands. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
“That is not what you do.”
“Then I’m sorry I offended you. But it is a proven fact that Barnave was a traitor.”
“What can I say? Treason is a betrayal, so there must be some state of trust and acceptance that precedes it. Barnave never pretended to be a republican. Camille respected him—I think it was mutual.”
“Is respect so rare a thing for my cousin to command?”
