“Do not parley with the rabble, citizen,” St. Just whispered eagerly. “This is a grand moment for you. Let the people of their own accord condemn those who dared to defame you.”
And even Couthon, the prudent, added sententiously:
“Such an opportunity may never occur again.”
The people, in truth, were over-ready to take vengeance into their own hands.
“Á la lanterne, les aristos!”
Gaunt, bedraggled forms leaned across the table, shook begrimed fists in the direction of the four crouching figures. With the blind instinct of trapped beasts, they retreated into the shadows step by step, as those threatening fists appeared to draw closer, clutching at the nearest table and dragging it with them, in an altogether futile attempt at a barricade.
“Holy Mother of God, protect us!” murmured Mme. de Serval from time to time.
Behind them there was nothing but the rows of houses, no means of escape even if their trembling knees had not refused them service; whilst vaguely, through their terror, they were conscious of the proximity of that awful asthmatic creature with the wheezy cough and the hideous, toothless mouth. At times he seemed so close that they shut their eyes, almost feeling his grimy hands around their throat, his huge, hairy arms dragging them down to death.
It all happened in the space of a very few minutes, far fewer even than it would take completely to visualise the picture. Robespierre, like an avenging wraith, theatrical yet impassive, standing in the light of a huge resin torch, which threw alternate lights and shadows, grotesque and weird, upon his meagre figure, now elongating the thin, straight nose, now widening the narrow mouth, misshaping the figure till it appeared like some fantastic ghoul-form from the nether world. Behind him, his two friends were lost in the gloom, as were now Mme. de Serval and her children. They were ensconced against a heavy porte-cochère, a rickety table alone standing between them and the mob, who were ready to drag them to the nearest lantern and immolate them before the eyes of their outraged idol.
“Leave the traitors alone!” Robespierre commanded. “Justice will deal with them as they deserve.”
“Á la lanterne!” the people—more especially the women—demanded insistently.
Robespierre turned to one of his “tappe-durs.”
“Take the aristos to the nearest Commissariat,” he said. “I’ll have no bloodshed to mar our Fraternal Supper.”
“The Commissariat, forsooth!” a raucous voice positively bellowed. “Who is going to stand between us and our vengeance? Robespierre has been outraged by this rabble. Let them perish in sight of all!”
How it all happened after that, none who were there could in truth have told you. The darkness, the flickering lights, the glow of the braziers, which made the inky blackness around more pronounced, made everything indistinguishable to ordinary human sight. Certain it is that citizen Rateau—who had constituted himself the spokesman of the mob—was at one time seen towering behind the four unfortunates, with his huge arms stretched out, his head thrown back, his mouth wide open, screaming abuse and vituperation, demanding the people’s right to take the law into its own sovereign hands.
At that moment the light of the nearest resin torch threw his hulking person into bold relief against a heavy porte-cochère which was immediately behind him. The mob acclaimed him, cheered him to the echoes, agreed with him that summary justice in such a case was lone satisfying. The next instant a puff of wind blew the flame of the torch in a contrary direction, and darkness suddenly enveloped the ranting colossus and the cowering prey all ready to his hand.
“Rateau!” shouted someone.
“Hey, there! citizen Rateau! Where art thou?” came soon from every side.
No answer came from the spot where Rateau had last been seen, and it seemed as if just then a strong current of air had slammed a heavy door to somewhere in the gloom. Citizen Rateau had disappeared, and the four traitors along with him.
It took a few seconds of valuable time ere the mob suspected that it was being robbed of its prey. Then a huge upheaval occurred, a motion of the human mass densely packed in the Rue St. Honoré, that was not unlike the rush of water through a narrow gorge.
“Rateau!” People were yelling the name from end to end of the street.
II
Superstition, which was rampant in these days of carnage and of crime, had possession of many a craven soul. Rateau had vanished. It seemed as if the Evil One, whose name had been so freely invoked during the course of the Fraternal Supper, had in very truth spirited Rateau away.
On the top of the tumult came a silence as complete as that of a graveyard at midnight. The “tappe-durs,” who at their chief’s command had been forging their way through the crowd, in order to reach the traitors, ceased their hoarse calls of “Make way there, in the name of the Convention!” whilst St. Just, who still stood close to his friend, literally saw the cry stifled on Robespierre’s lips.
Robespierre himself had not altogether realised what had happened. In his innermost heart he had already yielded to his friends’ suggestion, and was willing to let mob-law run its course. As St. Just had said: what a triumph for himself if his detractors were lynched by the mob! When Rateau towered above the four unfortunates, hurling vituperation above their heads, the tyrant smiled, well satisfied; and when the giant thus incontinently vanished, Robespierre for a moment or two remained complacent and content.
Then the whole crowd oscillated in the direction of the mysterious porte-cochère. Those who were in the front ranks threw themselves against the heavy panels, whilst those in the rear pushed with all their might. But the porte-cochères of old Paris are heavily constructed. Woodwork that had resisted the passage of centuries withheld the onslaught of a pack of half-starved caitiffs. But only for awhile.
The mob, fearing that it was getting foiled, broke into a howl of execration, and
