CHAPTER XXVII
The Fructidor Riots.
Many accounts, more or less authentic, have been published of the eventsknown to history as the "Fructidor Riots."
But this is how it all happened: at any rate it is the version relatedsome few days later in England to the Prince of Wales by no less apersonage than Sir Percy Blakeney; and who indeed should know betterthan The Scarlet Pimpernel himself?
Deroulede and Juliette Marny were the last of the batch of prisoners whowere tried on that memorable day of Fructidor.
There had been such a number of these, that all the covered carts in usefor the conveyance of prisoners to and from the Hall of Justice hadalready been despatched with their weighty human load; thus it was thatonly a rough wooden cart, hoodless and rickety, was available, and intothis Deroulede and Juliette were ordered to mount.
It was now close on nine o'clock in the evening. The streets of Paris,sparsely illuminated here and there with solitary oil lamps swung acrossfrom house to house on wires, presented a miserable and squalidappearance. A thin, misty rain had begun to fall, transforming theill-paved roads into morasses of sticky mud.
The Hall of Justice was surrounded by a howling and shrieking mob, who,having imbibed all the stores of brandy in the neighbouring drinkingbars, was now waiting outside in the dripping rain for the expresspurpose of venting its pent-up, spirit-sodden lust of rage against theman whom it had once worshipped, but whom now it hated. Men, women, andeven children swarmed round the principal entrances of the Palais deJustice, along the bank of the river as far as the Pont au Change, andup towards the Luxembourg Palace, now transformed into the prison, towhich the condemned would no doubt be conveyed.
Along the river-bank, and immediately facing the Palais de Justice, arow of gallows-shaped posts, at intervals of a hundred yards or more,held each a smoky petrol lamp, at a height of some eight feet from theground.
One of these lamps had been knocked down, and from the post itself therenow hung ominously a length of rope, with a noose at the end.
Around this improvised gallows a group of women sat, or rather squatted,in the mud; their ragged shifts and kirtles, soaked through with thedrizzling rain, hung dankly on their emaciated forms; their hair, insome cases grey, and in others dark or straw-coloured, clung mattedround their wet faces, on which the dirt and the damp had drawn weirdand grotesque lines.
The men were restless and noisy, rushing aimlessly hither and thither,from the corner of the bridge, up the Rue du Palais, fearful lest theirprey be conjured away ere their vengeance was satisfied.
Oh, how they hated their former idol now! Citizen Lenoir, with his broadshoulders and powerful, grime-covered head, towered above the throng;his strident voice, with its raucous, provincial accent, could bedistinctly heard above the din, egging on the men, shouting to thewomen, stirring up hatred against the prisoners, wherever it showedsigns of abating in intensity.
The coal-heaver, hailing from some distant province, seemed to have sethimself the grim task of provoking the infuriated populace to someterrible deed of revenge against Deroulede and Juliette.
The darkness of the street, the fast-falling mist which obscured thelight from the meagre oil lamps, seemed to add a certain weirdness tothis moving, seething multitude. No one could see his neighbour. In theblackness of the night the muttering or yelling figures moved about likesome spectral creatures from hellish regions--the Akous of Brittany whocall to those about to die; whilst the women squatting in the oozingmud, beneath that swinging piece of rope, looked like a group of ghostlywitches, waiting for the hour of their Sabbath.
As Deroulede emerged into the open, the light from a swinging lantern inthe doorway fell upon his face. The foremost of the crowd recognisedhim; a howl of execration went up to the cloud-covered sky, and ahundred hands were thrust out in deadly menace against him.
It seemed as if they whished to tear him to pieces.
"_A la lanterne! A la lanterne! le traitre!_"
He shivered slightly, as if with the sudden blast of cold, humid air,but he stepped quietly into the cart, closely followed by Juliette.
The strong escort of the National Guard, with Commandant Santerre andhis two drummers, had much ado to keep back the mob. It was not thepolicy of the revolutionary government to allow excesses of summaryjustice in the streets: the public execution of traitors on the Place dela Revolution, the processions in the tumbrils, were thought to bewholesome examples for other would-be traitors to mark and digest.
Citizen Santerre, military commandant of Paris, had ordered his men touse their bayonets ruthlessly, and, to further overawe the populace, heordered a prolonged roll of drums, lest Deroulede took it into his headto speak to the crowd.
But Deroulede had no such intention: he seemed chiefly concerned inshielding Juliette from the cold; she had been made to sit in the cartbeside him, and he had taken off his coat, and was wrapping it round heragainst the penetrating rain.
The eye-witnesses of these memorable events have declared that, at agiven moment, he looked up suddenly with a curious, eager expression inhis eyes, and then raised himself in the cart and seemed to be trying topenetrate the gloom round him, as if in search of a face, or perhaps avoice.
"_A la lanterne! A la lanterne!_" was the continual hoarse cry of themob.
Up to now, flanked in their rear by the outer walls of the Palais deJustice, the soldiers had found it a fairly easy task to keep the crowdat bay. But there came a time when the cart was bound to move out intothe open, in order to convey the prisoners along, by the Rue du Palais,up to the Luxembourg Prison.
This task, however, had become more and more difficult every moment. Thepeople of Paris, who for two years had been told by its tyrants that itwas supreme lord of the universe, was mad with rage at seeing itsdesires frustrated by a few soldiers.
The drums had been greeted by terrific yells, which effectually drownedtheir roll; the first movement of the cart was hailed by a veritabletumult.
Only the women who squatted round the gallows had not moved from theirposition of vantage; one of these Maegaeras was quietly readjusting therope, which had got out of place.
But all the men and some of the women were literally besieging the cart,and threatening the soldiers, who stood between them and the object oftheir fury.
It seemed as if nothing now could save Deroulede and Juliette from animmediate and horrible death.
"_A mort! A mort! A la lanterne les traitres!_"
Santerne himself, who had shouted himself hoarse, was at a loss what todo. He had sent one man to the nearest cavalry barracks, butreinforcements would still be some little time coming; whilst in themeanwhile his men were getting exhausted, and the mob, more and moreexcited, threatened to break through their line at every moment.
There was not another second to be lost.
Santerre was for letting the mob have its way, and he would willinglyhave thrown it the prey for which it clamoured; but orders were orders,and in the year I. of the Revolution it was not good to disobey.
At this supreme moment of perplexity he suddenly felt a respectful touchon his arm.
Close behind him a soldier of the National Guard--not one of his ownmen--was standing at attention, and holding a small, folded paper in hishand.
"Sent to you by the Minister of Justice," whispered the soldierhurriedly. "The citizen-deputies have watched the tumult from the Hall;they say, you must not lose an instant."
Santerre withdrew from the front rank, up against the side of the cart,where a rough stable lantern had been fixed. He took the paper from thesoldier's hand, and, hastily tearing it open, he read it by the dimlight of the lantern.
As he read, his thick, coarse features expressed the keenestsatisfaction.
"You have two more men with you?" he asked quickly.
"Yes, citizen," replied the man, pointing towards his right; "and theCitizen-Minister said you would give me two more."
"You'll take the prisoners quietly across to
the Prison of the Temple--you understand that?"
"Yes, citizen; Citizen Merlin has given me full instructions. You canhave the cart drawn back a little more under the shadow of the portico,where the prisoners can be made to alight; they can then given into mycharge. You in the meantime are to stay here with your men, round theempty cart, as long as you can. Reinforcements have been sent for, andmust soon be here. When they arrive you are to move along with the cart,as if you were making for the Luxembourg Prison. This manoeuvre willgive us time to deliver the prisoners safely at the Temple."
The man spoke hurriedly and peremptorily, and Santerne was only tooready to obey. He felt relieved at thought of reinforcements, and gladto be rid of the responsibility of conducting such troublesomeprisoners.
The thick mist, which grew more and more dense, favoured the newmanoeuvre, and the constant roll of drums drowned the hastily givenorders.
The cart was drawn back into the deepest shadow of the great portico,and whilst the mob were howling their loudest, and yelling out franticdemands for the traitors, Deroulede and Juliette were summarily orderedto step out of the cart. No one saw them, for the darkness here wasintense.
"Follow quietly!" whispered a raucous voice in their ears as they didso, "or my orders are to shoot you where you stand."
But neither of them had any wish for resistance. Juliette, cold andnumb, was clinging to Deroulede, who had placed a protecting arm roundher.
Santerne had told off two of his men to join the new escort of theprisoners, and presently the small party, skirting the walls of thePalais de Justice, began to walk rapidly away from the scene of theriot.
Deroulede noted that some half-dozen men seemed to be surrounding himand Juliette, but the drizzling rain blurred every outline. Theblackness of the night too had become absolutely dense, and in thedistance the cries of the populace grew more and more faint.