by Eugène Sue
“Allow me, citizen colleague, to introduce to you a former priest, the reverend Father Morlet. He is of the Society of Jesus, as I was of the Order of the Oratory. Cassock and frock go together.”
“But,” replied the attorney, very uneasily, as he returned the Jesuit’s salute, “the object of the conference which brings us together can not be discussed before witnesses.”
“The reverend is one of us,” answered Fouché. “He comes from London, and will give us information of the greatest importance. His head answers for his discretion; he is a dissident priest. And so, let us get to work.”
Fouché, Durand-Maillane, Tallien, Abbot Morlet and advocate Desmarais thereupon seated themselves about a round table. Desmarais was made chairman, and the conference began.
“I ask the floor,” said Durand-Maillane, “to state the question, and to establish the conditions upon which as spokesman of the leaders of the Right, I am empowered to pledge here the assistance of my political friends, royalists, clericals, and conservatives.”
“You have the floor,” said the chairman.
Durand-Maillane continued:
“Gentlemen, none of you is unaware that in presenting the law of the 22nd Prairial to the Convention six weeks ago Robespierre hoped to obtain for the Committee of Public Safety, and under control of three of its members, the right to pass judgment upon the Representatives of the people without consulting the Assembly. Whence it follows that, by means of the signatures of St. Just and Couthon, Robespierre would be able at any time to send before the revolutionary tribunal, that is to say, to the scaffold, those members of the Convention whom he wished to be rid of. The law of Prairial threatened particularly the Terrorists; its effect would soon have extended to the other parties. It is necessary that we examine and discuss the most significant passages of Robespierre’s speech to-day in the Convention, in order to decide what we are to do to temper its effect and conjure away the danger which overhangs us. Here are the particular points of the speech.”
Durand-Maillane drew a paper from his pocket and read:
“‘The counter-revolution has made its appearance in all parties. The conspirators have pushed us, in spite of ourselves, to violent measures, which their crimes alone rendered necessary. This system is the work of the foreigners, who proposed it through the venal medium of Chabot, Lhuilier, Hebert, and a number of other scoundrels. Every effort must be made to restore the Republic to a natural and mild rule; this work has not yet commenced. Slacken the reins of the Revolution for a moment, and you will see military despotism seize upon it, and overturn the maligned national representation; a century of civil wars and calamities will desolate our country, and we would die for not having seized the moment marked by history for the founding of liberty. Aye, we would deliver up our country to calamities without number, and the people’s maledictions will fall upon our memory, which should remain dear to the human race....
“‘The conclusion is, What are we to do? Our duty! What objection can be raised to one’s speaking the truth and consenting to die for it? Let it be said, then, that there is a conspiracy against the public liberty, which owes its force to a criminal coalition that is intriguing in the very heart of the Convention; that this coalition has accomplices in the Committee of General Surety and in the bureaus of this committee, which it dominates; — that the enemies of the Republic have set this committee up against the Committee of Public Safety, thus constituting a government within a government; — that members of the Committee of Public Safety are in the plot; — that the coalition thus formed is working for the destruction of patriots and of the fatherland. What is the remedy for this evil? Punish the traitors, reorganize the bureaus of the Committee of General Surety, purge the Committee itself, and subordinate it to the Committee of Public Safety; purge the Committee of Public Safety itself; establish unity of government under the supreme authority of the National Convention, which should be the center and the judge; suppress all factions by the weight of national authority, and rear upon their ruins the power of justice and liberty. Such are the principles the hour demands. If it is impossible to advance them without earning the epithet Ambitious, I shall conclude that principles are outlawed, that tyranny reigns among us, — but not that I should keep quiet; for how can one object to a man who is right, and who knows how to die for his country? I am made to fight crime, not to govern it. The time is not yet come when men of worth can serve the country fearlessly. The defenders of liberty are no better than exiles, so long as there exists the horde of rogues and rascals.’
“So, gentlemen, to sum up this harangue of Robespierre’s, we find out that ‘it is necessary to bring back the Republic to a milder rule, to check the bloodshed, to purge the Convention and the Committees, to wipe out factions by the weight of national authority, and to combat crime, because the defenders of liberty are but exiles as long as the horde of rogues and rascals exists.’ There remains no one, it seems, outside of Robespierre and the Jacobins, capable of defending, preserving and strengthening the Republic. Therefore we, royalists and clericals, have decided to form a coalition with the Terrorists and the Mountain for the purpose of sending Robespierre to the scaffold, and, along with him, the most active spirits of the Jacobin party.”
“I declare my approval of all the previous speaker has said,” observed Morlet the Jesuit. “Robespierre is the enemy not only of us Catholics and royalists, but also of the Terrorists and Mountainists here present, and of several of their friends, who insist upon living in splendor, peace and happiness at the popular expense.”
“Robespierre to-morrow will attempt to hold a ‘day,’ with the support of Commandant Henriot and the Commune. His designs must be frustrated,” added Tallien.
“The surest way of reaching our end,” Fouché advised, “is to drown St. Just’s voice when he mounts the tribunal to complete the speech of Robespierre. He will want to speak in defense of his partner. Our cries will redouble: ‘Down with the tyrant!’ ‘Down with the dictator!’ ‘Death to St. Just and Robespierre!’”
“It is decided, then,” asked Durand-Maillane, “that from the beginning of the session we are to interrupt St. Just and Robespierre, and demand of the Assembly their immediate arrest? Who will start the ball?”
“I will,” volunteered Tallien.
“Collot D’Herbois, Robespierre’s implacable enemy, is in the chair to-morrow. The affair will go roundly,” Desmarais plucked up heart enough to say.
“It is probable,” continued the Jesuit, “that the Convention will not confine itself to packing to the guillotine Robespierre, St. Just, Couthon, Lebas, and the other leaders of this truculent party of virtue. It may add to the batch several of the most rabid Jacobins from outside of the Convention.”
“We shall rid ourselves at once of the big guns of the club, and the Jacobins in the Commune, Fleuriot-Lescot the Mayor, Coffinhal, and their consorts,” chuckled Tallien.
“I greatly desire,” the Jesuit put in, “for motives of my own, to see included in that batch a certain John Lebrenn, who has been made member of the General Council of the Commune since his return from the army.”
At the mention of the name Fouché turned to Desmarais and said, with a leer, “Hey, colleague, the reverend Father demands your son-in-law!”
To which Desmarais grandiosely replied: “Brutus gave his own son — and this Lebrenn is not even of my family. I grant you the Jacobin’s head.”
“To-morrow, messieurs, let us be present at the Assembly before the opening of the session, in order to prepare our colleagues of the Right and the Center for what we expect of them,” suggested Durand-Maillane.
“Fouché and I,” acquiesced Tallien, “will take care of the Mountain and the Terrorists.”
So it was arranged. The cabal then broke up, while Jesuit Morlet said to himself:
“The Republic is lost. The sacrifice of the Jacobins delivers it up to us, bound hand and foot — ad majorem Dei gloriam! to the greater glory of God! May France per
ish, and our holy Order triumph!”
During this mental invocation of the Jesuit’s, Desmarais showed his four guests to the door and returned to his parlor alone. For some time he brooded somber and silent in his arm chair. At last he muttered defiantly:
“Was it I who demanded the guillotining of my son-in-law? After all, it will be but justice; I will have returned him evil for evil. Is he not, truly speaking, the prime cause of my torments? After his death my daughter and wife will return to me. Everything will be for the best!”
CHAPTER XXXIII.
ARREST OF ROBESPIERRE.
EARLY THE NEXT morning the chiefs of the anti-Robespierre factions were in the Riding Hall of the Tuileries, where the sessions of the Convention were held. At about eight o’clock Tallien came in. As he walked to his seat on the crest of the Mountain, he passed along in front of the benches of the Right, greeting Durand-Maillane and his friends with an “Oh! what brave men are these of the Right!” Collot D’Herbois, that ex-comedian, thief and criminal, occupied the president’s chair. St. Just, coming into the hall, went up to Robespierre, who appeared to give him some instructions. Couthon was carried to his seat between Robespierre the younger and Lebas by two ushers; he was paralyzed in both legs. These three citizens were counted among the purest, the most generous and energetic of the time. Long before the opening of the session the galleries were filled with people picked and stationed there by the enemies of Robespierre. The latter took his seat, an air of firm assurance dominating the preoccupation legible on his austere features. He knew not of the plot laid against him, and depended upon St. Just’s speech to settle in his favor the question of accusation unhappily left undecided the night before. The chiefs of the allied factions exchanged signals of intelligence. Billaud-Varenne was speaking with one of the vice-presidents of the Convention, Thuriot, an irreproachable Terrorist. The whole aspect of the Assembly was foreboding. Suddenly the tinkling of Collot D’Herbois’s bell sounded above the tumult of conversation, and the session was on.
Why follow the debate into all its bitterness and spite; why tell how again and again the plotters against the Republic raised their cries of “Down with the tyrant! Death to St. Just and Robespierre!”? Suffice it to say that the day ended in decrees of accusation against the Robespierres, elder and younger, St. Just, Lebas, and Couthon. An officer of the gendarmery was commissioned by the president to lead the accused to prison.
At five o’clock that afternoon, the 9th Thermidor, Madam Desmarais and her daughter, seated side by side in their parlor, pricked their ears at hearing the sound of the drum, mingled from time to time with the hurried and distant clanging of the tocsin.
“My God!” exclaimed Madam Desmarais, grief-stricken, “Again a ‘day’ — again a bloody struggle!”
“Reassure yourself, good mother; the wicked shall not triumph,” Charlotte replied. “Robespierre is put under ban of arrest, but the Jacobins and the Sections will go to his rescue. The Commune has declared the country in danger, the tocsin calls the people to arms.”
“Alas, I fear for your husband. He is at the City Hall as a member of the General Council. The Commune is in insurrection against the Convention; if the Commune loses, John will have become an outlaw.”
“My husband will do his duty; the future belongs to God.”
Suddenly Castillon entered the parlor, crying: “Good news! The Sections are taking arms and assembling to march to the Commune, with their cannon; the Jacobins have declared themselves in permanent session. Robespierre has been taken to the Luxembourg Prison; his brother to St. Lazare; St. Just to the Scotch Prison; Couthon to La Bourbe; and Lebas to the Chatelet. As I left the City Hall they were discussing the means of rescuing them.”
“You see, mother, the Sections are in the majority, with the Commune.”
“Ah, madam, madam!” cried Gertrude, running in in a fright. “Don’t be too alarmed — Oh, heavens, there he is!”
Hardly had Gertrude uttered these words when advocate Desmarais, pale, half frightened to death, tumbled into the room, crying: “Save me! In heaven’s name!”
And running to his wife and daughter, whom he pressed in his arms, he continued wailing, “Hide me! They are after me!”
“Fright has unbalanced you, father,” said Charlotte. “No one is pursuing you.”
Madam Desmarais had hurriedly found a bottle of smelling salts, which she held to the nose of her half-fainting spouse. He recovered his senses, and began again, in a quaking voice: “Thank you. You are generous. Now, I beseech you both, conceal me somewhere. Charlotte’s husband may come back and be accompanied by some member of the General Council. I shall be recognized — arrested — guillotined. Pity me!”
“But, father, your fears are all exaggerated. My husband will not allow you to be arrested in his house.”
At that moment Gertrude, opening a crack of the door, called mysteriously to her mistress:
“Madam, come at once!”
“What is it, Gertrude?” Charlotte asked. “Who is there?”
“A man of the mounted police demands to speak with you.”
Hearing the nature of the visitor, Monsieur Desmarais flew into a new fit of fear. His mind gave way. He ran to a window and sought to hide by wrapping himself up in the curtains. Charlotte left the room, closing the door behind her. In a second she was back, joyfully waving a paper she held in her hand. “It is good news, mother. Where’s father?”
Madam Desmarais indicated with a gesture the window, the curtains of which revealed the figure of the attorney, and left his feet exposed at the bottom. Then she added, in a low voice: “If we do not hide your father somehow, he will die of agony and fright.”
“His fright is baseless, but I think you are right about it,” responded Charlotte in the same tone. “We can take him up to the garret, to the locked room; there he will no doubt feel that he is safe, and his fears will calm down.” And she went to the window where her father, white as a sheet and bathed in a cold sweat, was clinging for support to the window casing.
“That gendarme!” stammered the lawyer. “What did he want?”
“He just brought me a letter from John. I shall read it to you and mother, after which you will be taken, as you wish, to a retreat, in the top of the house, where you need not fear being seen by a soul. Here is what John wrote me:
“Dearly beloved wife: — All goes well here so far. The General Council of the Commune is almost complete. We are advising on energetic and prompt measures — prompt above all; the Convention, on its side, is not idle. We are in session. The majority of the Sections are with us. We shall receive word in an instant that the suburbs of St. Antoine and Marceau are ready to march; we await their delegates. The City Hall Place is covered with an armed force, furnished with several pieces of artillery, and all crying ‘Long live the Republic! Down with the brigands of the Convention!’ Robespierre and his friends are still in prison; we shall deliver them. Be of good cheer, and remember that you live not alone for
“Your
“J. L.
“Tell Castillon to join me as soon as possible. He is a sure man, and I shall need him.”
“If the suburbs march with the Commune, the Convention is lost!” murmured the lawyer. “Conduct me to the hiding place you spoke of. You shall lock me in, you will keep the key about you, you will not give the key to anyone, not even to your husband — you promise me?”
“I swear it;” and forcing a smile, the young woman added: “I alone shall be your jailer. Come, come.”
As she went out, Charlotte said to her mother, “Please ask Gertrude to have Castillon wait for me in the parlor.” The advocate staggered out on the arm of his daughter. Looking after him, Madam Desmarais sighed to herself, “Unhappy man! I pity him.” Sinister reflections followed close: “The triumph of Robespierre will mean the death of Billaud-Varenne, our friend, our protector, he who has prevented, to this very day, my brother Hubert from being called before the revolutionary tribunal. But when
he is there no longer, who will take his place in protecting my brother’s life? Alas, this day, whatever its issue, will hold a sad outcome for our family. How can one prepare for such a crisis?”
Charlotte at that moment returned, bearing the walnut casket in which reposed the legends and relics of the Lebrenn family. Madam Desmarais, running to her daughter quickly, said, in a tone of reproach, as she helped her set the casket down on a table, “Could you not have called Gertrude, instead of yourself carrying such a burden?”
“Have you asked Castillon to come here, good mother? I wish to set him to a task.”
“I forgot your request, my girl. I shall at once repair the forgetfulness, and go seek your foreman. But before all, tell me, why you have brought this box in here?”
“I wish to place it in a safe and secret place, with Castillon’s aid, dear mother. You know what store John and I set by the papers and objects contained in it. In these times of revolution, one must think of everything. John will be grateful to me for the precaution.” So saying, she rang the bell.
Castillon entered. The foreman seemed preoccupied. He had slung on his cartridge box, his sword, and his volunteer’s rifle.
“Put this chest on your shoulder and follow me, brave Castillon,” said Charlotte. “I shall soon be back, dear mother. Hope and courage, all will go well! The Commune will triumph over the Convention.”
“Oh, my presentiments, my presentiments did not deceive me,” moaned Madam Desmarais after her daughter’s and Castillon’s departure. “This day will be fatal to us!”
Ten o’clock at night of that same day found the General Council of the Insurrectionary Commune of Paris still in session in that chamber of the City Hall called the Equality Chamber. The open windows gave on the square choked with citizens. Their bayonets and pike-heads glittered in the light of numerous torches; several cannon had been dragged up by the Sections, and from time to time one might hear cries of “Long live the Republic!” “Long live the Commune!” Within, torches lighted the vast expanse of the Equality Chamber, and the table about which sat, under the presidency of Fleuriot-Lescot the Mayor of Paris, the members of the Council of the Commune.