Kilgorman: A Story of Ireland in 1798

by Talbot Baines Reed

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

  "VIVE LA GUILLOTINE!"

  It was midnight when I got clear of the Auberge "a l'Irlandois" in theRue d'Agnes, and being a fine, warm autumn night I was by no means theonly occupant of the street. This was fortunate for me, for the guardsposted at either end would have been more inquisitive as to a solitarystranger than one of a company of noisy idlers.

  That night there had been a great performance in one of the theatres inParis, which had lasted far into the night, and was only lately over.Those I overheard speak of it said it had been a great patrioticspectacle, in the course of which National Guards and cadets had marchedacross the stage, unfurling the banner of the Republic, and taking theoath of the people amid scenes of wild enthusiasm and shouting. To addto the enthusiasm of the occasion a party of real volunteers hadappeared, and after receiving the three-coloured cockade from theirsweethearts, had shouldered their guns and marched, singing theMarseillaise, straight from the theatre to the road for La Vendue, wherethey were going to shed their blood for their country.

  The audience had risen, waving hats and handkerchiefs to bid them God-speed, and then poured forth into the streets, shouting the chorus, andcheering till they were hoarse and tired.

  It was into a party of such loyal revellers that I found myself suckedbefore I was half-way out of the Rue d'Agnes; and yelling and shoutingat the top of my voice I passed safely the guards, and reached the broadRue Saint Honore. Here the crowd gradually dispersed, some one way,some another, while a few, with cries of "_A la Place_," held on incompany. With these I joined myself, and presently came to a great opensquare, where on a high platform stood a grim and terrible lookingobject. "_Vive la guillotine_!" shouted the crowd as they caught sightof it.

  It was strangely lit up with the glare of the torches of some workmenwho were evidently busy upon it. I could see the fatal knife beingraised once or twice and let fall with a crash by way of experiment.And each time the crowd cheered and laughed, and invited one of theirnumber to ascend the platform and put his head in the empty collar. Itmade me sick to watch it, yet for safety's sake I had to shout "_Vive laguillotine_!" with the rest of them, and laugh with the loudest.

  Presently some one near noticed me and caught me by the arm.

  "Here is one that will do, Citoyen Samson. Lift him up, comrades. Letus see if the knife is sharp enough."

  At the touch of his hand I broke into a cold sweat, and clung to hisknees amid shouts of laughter. It was all very well for them, who wereused to such jests. I was new to it, and fell a victim to a panic suchas I have never known since. A herculean strength seemed to possess me.I flung my tormentors right and left, and darted away from them intothe dark recesses of the surrounding gardens. They began by givingchase, but in the end let me go, and returned to their more congenialspectacle, and presently, tired even of that, went home to bed.

  It was an hour before I durst look out from my hiding-place in the midstof a clump of thick bushes. I could still see the guillotine looming inthe moonlight; but the workmen, like the sightseers, had gone. The onlyliving persons were a few women, who had seated themselves on one of thebenches in front of the instrument, evidently determined on a good viewof to-morrow's spectacle.

  I retreated to my hiding-place with a shudder, glad I was too far awayto overhear their talk.

  But if I heard not theirs, I heard, oddly enough, another conversation,so near that had it been intended for my ears it could not have takenplace in a better spot.

  One of the speakers, by his voice, was an Englishman, of more thanmiddle age; the other, a woman, who also spoke English, but with aforeign accent.

  This is what I heard, and you may guess how much of it I comprehended:--

  "No news yet?" said the old man anxiously.

  "None. I expected to hear before this."

  "Who is the messenger?"

  "A trusty servant of madame's, and an Irishman."

  "So much the worse if he is caught."

  There was a pause. Then the old man inquired,--

  "What hope is there for Sillery?"

  "Absolutely none. He is as good as guillotined already."

  "Has Edward no influence then?"

  "Not now. Duport is no longer a man, but a machine--deadly, mysterious,as yonder guillotine. He would denounce me, his wife, if the Republicdemanded it."

  "God forbid! for you are our last friend."

  Then there was another pause, and the man spoke again. He was evidentlybroken-down by terror, and engrossed in his own safety.

  "My fear _now_ is," he said, "that, if Sillery is doomed, the messengershould deliver Edward's letter to Duport at all. It will only makematters worse for us."

  "Very true. It is no time for appeals to mercy," said Madame Duport."But you said you expected a letter for yourself."

  "Ay; money to escape with. That's all I live for."

  "Money from Edward?"

  "No. From my kinswoman, Alice Gorman.--Hush! what was that?" he cried,breaking into a whisper.

  "Only a falling leaf.--How was she to reach you?"

  "She was to send it to Edward, and he would forward it by the samemessenger that carried his letter to Duport."

  "Pray Heaven that be lost too," said the lady. "You are safer in Paris.Besides, money without a passport will avail nothing."

  The old man gave a bitter laugh.

  "They all desert me," said he querulously. "My nephew never shows sign;Sillery is to perish, you fear to speak to me; even my poor wife chidesme."

  "Surely Madame Lestrange--"

  Here I started again, and slight as was the sound it broke up theconference. They separated, one in either direction, the lady glidingtowards the benches in front of the guillotine, the old man (whom I nowknew to be Mr Lestrange) creeping under the shadow of the trees, andpresently lying at full length on a seat apparently fast asleep.

  I curled myself up on a seat not far off, where I could watch himwithout being seen by him. A little before dawn he got up, and aftercarefully looking up and down the road, walked hurriedly back towardsthe Place de la Revolution, where he lost himself among the nowincreasing groups who mustered in the grey light for an early seat atthe spectacle of the hour.

  I dropped into a seat not far off, and in the distance, among a row ofpale, hard, fatigued faces, I could see the deputy's wife, who neverlooked our way, but sat with her eyes fixed on the dreadful machine.

  The old man looked across at her once and again, and then triednervously to join in the general talk, and nod assent to the loyalsentiments of those who crowded near.

  As for me, I was too sick even to keep up appearances, and was thankfulwhen one rough interloper shouldered me from my place and sent mesprawling down among the feet of the onlookers.

  "Shame! Let the young citoyen have a view," called some one.

  "We are all equal," said the usurper. "Let him take the place from me,and he may have it."

  I declined the challenge, and slunk off at the back of the crowd, whichwas all too busy and expectant to heed whether I got a view or not.

  What I heard that morning was bad enough. There was the sound of thedrums and the dull rumble of wheels, drowned by yells and shouts fromthe men and screams from the women; then a silence, when no one stirred,but every neck was craned forward to see; then a sudden tap of the drum;then the harsh crash of the knife; then a gasp from a thousand throats,and a great yell of "_Vive la Liberte_." Three times I heard it all.Then the spectacle was at an end, and the crowd dispersed.

  I kept a keen look-out among the groups that straggled past me for thebent figure of Mr Lestrange, but no sign of him could I see. Afterall, thought I, this errand of mine to Paris was to be all for nothing,when close by I perceived Citoyenne Duport walking aloof from the crowdand bending her steps towards the gardens. I resolved, cost what itmight, not to lose sight of her, and followed her at a distance till thepaths were quite deserted.

  Then I quickened my steps and
came up with her.

  "Madame Duport," said I boldly, "I am the messenger you and MrLestrange expect."

  She looked round at me with blanched face, and held up her hand with agesture of silence.

  "No, no," said she, "I am not Madame Duport. You mistake, my friend."

  "Madame need not fear me; I am no _mouchard_. I overheard all you andMr Lestrange said last night. Here is the letter I bear to DeputeDuport. Either I must deliver it myself or ask madame to do so."

  She held out her hand for it.

  "We are at your mercy," said she. "Is this from Lord Edward himself?"

  "I know nothing of it, madame," said I, and recounted the story of how Ihad come by the missive in the wood near Morlaix.

  She sighed, and said,--

  "John Cassidy is happier where he lies than we are. Is this your onlymissive?"

  "No; I have a letter for Mr Lestrange, and beg you to tell me hisaddress."

  At that moment she looked round, and gave a little scream as first afootstep, then a voice, fell on her ear.

  "Adele," said a lean, bilious-looking man, with a hard, pinched face andknit lips, approaching from one of the side-walks--"Adele, what do youhere?"

  "My husband," said the lady, so far recovering her composure as to smileand advance to meet him, "you are come in a good moment. This lad bearsa missive for you, and, having discovered me in the crowd, was beggingme to deliver it for him. Here it is."

  Duport took the letter with a frigid glance at me as if to say hebelieved not a word of the story, and mechanically tore it open.

  I watched his eyebrows give a sudden twitch as he read the contents.

  "Who gave you this?" demanded he.

  I repeated my story, which once more he received with an incredulousstare.

  Then turning to his wife he said, half to himself, half to her,--

  "From Edward Fitzgerald on behalf of his kinsman, Sillery. But toolate. Come, Adele. The twenty-two are before the Tribunal to-day, andI have a place for you in the gallery."

  And without heeding me further (for which I was devoutly thankful), hedrew his wife's arm in his own and walked off rapidly in the directionof the Tuileries.

  Lest my reader should suppose that my letter to Depute Duport was one ofgreat moment to my own story, let me say at once it was not so, at leastdirectly. It was, as the deputy had said, a letter addressed by LordEdward Fitzgerald, a young Irish nobleman (of whom more hereafter), toDuport, claiming, for the sake of old comradeship, his good offices onbehalf of one of the twenty-two impeached Girondist deputies, Sillery byname, whose adopted daughter, or, rather, the adopted daughter of whosewife, Lord Edward had lately married. Many letters of the kind were nodoubt constantly coming into the hands of powerful members of theConvention just then; and many, like it, came too late.

  Next morning, so I was told, the whole of the accused, and Sillery firstof the batch, were guillotined; the headsman doing his work with suchdexterity that in thirty-one minutes the twenty-two were all disposedof.

  My letter to Mr Lestrange (which I still carried in my stocking) wasanother matter, and concerned me considerably, especially now that Iunderstood it was from my lady at Knockowen. Where to find him I knewnot, and to be found with the letter on me might compromise not merelyme but him and his Irish kinsfolk.

  All things considered, I decided to read the letter and commit it tomemory, and then destroy it, hoping my good intentions might be excuseenough for the breach of faith. And, indeed, when that afternoon Isought a sheltered place in the woods and produced the soiled andstained letter from my stocking, I was glad I had done what I did.

  "Dear Cousin," wrote my lady at Knockowen, "I hear there is a chance ofgetting a letter to you by the messenger who is to carry back LordEdward's petition on behalf of the poor Marquis Sillery. Your nephew,Captain Lestrange, told us of his trouble when he was here in thesummer, and gave us to understand there was little to be hoped for. IfSillery perish, your position in Paris will be painful indeed. I wouldfain send you the money you ask for, but Maurice keeps me so low infunds that I cannot even pay for my own clothes. I trust, however, yournephew may bring you some relief, as he spoke of going to Paris thisautumn on a secret mission for the English Government. Affairs with usare very bad, and, indeed, Maurice succeeds so ill in winning theconfidence of either party, loyalist or rebel, that he talks of sendingme and Kit over to you till times are better here. Take the threat forwhat it is worth, for I should be as sorry as you would, and I hearParis is a dreadful place to be in now. But you know Maurice. Kit iswell, but all our troubles prey on her spirits. I suspect if yournephew were in Paris, she would be easier reconciled to our threatenedpilgrimage than I. Between ourselves, my dear cousin, as Maurice nowholds all the mortgages for your Irish estates, it would be well to keepin with him, even if the price be a visit from your affectionatecousin,--

  "Alice Gorman."

  "P.S.--I forget if you are still in the Quai Necker, but am told LordEdward's messenger will know where to deliver this."

  Such was my lady's letter, and you may guess if it did not set the bloodtingling in my veins, and make Paris seem a very different place fromwhat it was an hour before.

  I carefully read and re-read the letter till I had it by heart, and thenas carefully tore it into a thousand pieces and scattered them to thewind. The one sentence referring to Captain Lestrange's visit as anagent for the British Government was (little as I yet knew of the stateof affairs in Paris) enough to hurry the innocent folk to whom it wasaddressed to the guillotine. What if my little lady and her mother wereby this time in this terrible city and liable to the same fate?

  I spent that afternoon wandering along the river on both banks, seekingfor the Quai Necker, but nothing of that name could I find. The nameswere mostly new, and in honour of some person or place illustrious inthe Revolution. At last, in despair, I was giving up the quest, when onan old book-stall I lit upon a plan of Paris dated ten years ago.

  The _bouquineur_, a sour fellow whose trade had evidently suffered inrecent months, would by no means allow me to look at it till I had paidthe five sous he demanded, which I was glad enough to do. And after avery little study I found the Quai Necker marked down near thecathedral; and having carefully noted its bearings, I carried my map toa stall higher up, where I sold it for eight sous, thus making one ofthe most profitable bargains I ever struck.

  Before dark, and while all Paris was ringing with the news that thetwenty-two unfortunate Girondists were to be executed next morning, Ifound myself standing in a shabby passage beside the river, under theshadow of the great cathedral of Notre Dame.