XXII
AN EXECUTION
"Not much water about, is there?"
"That's so, old 'un.... If I'd known, it's boats I'd have taken to!"
"Bah! Your shoes are big enough. That's not saying it's weather for aChristian to be out in!"
"Don't you grumble, old 'un! The more it comes down cats and dogs, thefewer stumps will be stirring out doors!... But a comrade or two will beon the prowl, eh?"
"Right-o, old bird!... Keep a lookout!... Sure he'll come this way?"
"You bet your nut he will!... He got my bit of a scrawl thismorning...."
"What then?"
"Shut up! Shut up! Folks coming!"
* * * * *
The night was inky black. Rain fell with sudden violence, threshed anddriven by icy gusts of wind. The hour was late: the rue Raffet desertedsave for the two men who had ventured out into the tempestuous darkness.They advanced with difficulty, side by side, speaking low. Roughcustomers to deal with. Their faces were emaciated from excessivedrinking: their eyes gleamed, their voices were hoarse: a brutal pair!But their movements were souple and lively: they walked with thatungainly swagger affected by the light-fingered gentry and the criminalsof the underworld of Paris.
"And what did you say in your scrawl?"
"Oh, medlars! Take-ins! You know!... I didn't put my fist to it,though!"
"Who then?"
"You ask that?"
"I'm no wizard! If it wasn't your fist, whose then?"
"My woman...."
"Ernestine?"
"Yes. Ernestine."
They struggled on through the squally darkness. Then one of the twobroke the silence.
"You're not jealous, Beadle, making your girl write letters to suchfolk?"
That sinister hooligan, the Beadle, burst out laughing.
"Jealous? Me? Jealous of Ernestine? You make me laugh, you really do,old Beard!"
But Beard did not share his companion's mirth. He leaned against apalisade to take breath, while a little sheltered from the fierceonslaughts of the wind.
"I tell you what," he said in a gruff and threatening voice: "I don'tlike such dodges--like those of this evening...."
"Why so, monsieur?"
"Why, because, after all, it's a comrade!"
"But he's betrayed--a traitor he is!"
"What do we know about it?"
The Beadle nodded; reflected.
"What does anyone know about it?" he said at last....
"Why, when the comrades told us, weren't they surprised, one and all?Nibet, Toulouche, even Mimile--they didn't hesitate, not one of them!...Well then, old 'un, as all the pals were of one mind, why hesitate?What's the use of discussing!... but, between you and me, I don't relishit either--it bothers me to go for a pal!..."
Just then the tempest redoubled its fury: it seemed to the cowering menas though all the devils of the storm were galloping down the wind.Somewhere there was a moon, for scurrying clouds were dancing a witches'saraband across a faintly clearer sky. The unseen moon was mastering theobscurity of this midnight hour.
By now, the two sinister beings were nearing the rue du Docteur-Blanche.They were passing a garden, in which tall poplars, caught by the squall,took fantastic shapes: they were nightmare trees, terrifyingly strange.
"No more to be said," remarked the Beadle. "The scene is set!... Whereis the meeting place?"
"A hundred yards from there--a little before the corner of the boulevardMontmorency...."
"Good! And the trap?"
"It waits for us a little further off."
"Who's aboard it?"
"Mimile."
"That's good."
The two men were now half-way along rue Raffet. The watch had begun.Gripped by the cold they waited in silence.... The minutes passedslowly, slowly, in the deserted street ... The Beard put his hand on theBeadle's shoulder.... A vague sound could be heard in the distance: thesteps could be distinguished; some pedestrian was coming up the rueRaffet in their direction.
"It is he!" whispered the Beadle.
"It is he!" affirmed the Beard. "He's not oversteady on his feet!"
"Perhaps he's ill shod!"
The two spoke low and in a jesting tone: it relieved the painful tensionof the moment--a comrade was marching to meet his death, and theirs thehands to deal that death--but not yet: it was a reaction against theirsense of the looming tragedy of this dark hour!
Now a man's advancing figure could be discerned. He came nearer. He wasplainly, by the cut of his garments, an indoor servant. The collar ofhis coat was turned up: he had his hands in his pockets: he walked fast.
"Hey! You down there! The gang!" cried the Beard, hailing the oncomingfigure.
"Ah, it's you?"
"Yes, it's me, comrade."
"And you too, Beadle?"
"As you say...."
"What do you want of me? Since my arrest and escape from the SaladBasket, I'm not anxious to stroll about this neighbourhood--out withit!"
The Beard said in a joking tone:
"You don't suspect, then? Speak out, Jules!..."
Jules--for it was indeed he--shook his head.
"My word, I have no idea what you want!... Who wrote to me this morning?Ernestine?"
Neither the Beadle nor Beard replied.
The three men stood talking in the deserted street, bending their headsand backs under the rain, which was now pouring harder than ever.
"Come on then! Make haste!" said Jules. "Come now, tell me what's thepoint--what's up--spit it out, comrades!... I don't want to be soaked tothe skin, you know!"
The Beadle forced the pace: he lifted his great hairy sinewy hand,brought it down heavily on Jules' shoulder, and in a changed voice,harsh, rough, imperative, he commanded:
"You must follow us!" Already he had his man fast. The unsuspiciousJules did not grasp the situation in the least.
"Follow you?" he asked. "As to that, certainly not!... No more walkingfor me in such weather. Wait for a sunny day, say I!... But whatever isthe matter with you--eh?... What?... Why are you sticking out your jawsat me like this? Out with it, my lambs!... Where am I to follow you?...You won't say, Messieurs Beadle and Beard?
"You won't say?..."
Beard moved a step and got behind Jules unnoticed. He repeated in thesame tone, harsh, threatening:
"You've got to follow us, I tell you!"
Instinctively Jules tried to turn round. The Beadle's strong grip kepthim motionless. Then he understood. He was afraid.
"What's come to you?" he cried in a trembling voice.
The Beadle cut him short.
"Enough! Will you follow us? Yes or no?"
Jules was going to say "no!" but he had not the time! Quick as lightningthe Beadle flung a long scarf round his neck, stuck his knee into hisvictim's back, and pulled!
Jules uttered a faint groan; but, half stifled, nearly strangled, he hadnot the strength to attempt the slightest self-defence.
Directly he was flung backwards on the ground, where he measured hislength and lay nearly stunned, Beard jumped on him, knelt on his chest,and pinioned him. Jules lay motionless.
The Beard now began tying up the legs of their victim.
"Pass me a scarf!"
"There it is, old 'un!"
"Very good, I am going to apply a 'Be Discreet.'"
The "Be Discreet" of the Beard was a gag, which he rolled round theservant's head in expert fashion.
"Feet firm?" asked the Beard.
"Oh, jolly fine!" said the Beadle. He turned his man over as though hewere a bale of goods. Now he tied his victim's hands behind his back.
"Is it far to go to the jaunting car?"
"No--for two sous, that's it!"
A motor-car was indeed coming slowly and noiselessly along rue Raffet:it was a sumptuous car!
"And if it is not he?"
"Stick him up against the bank ... dark as it is, there's every chancehe won't be seen."
&nb
sp; Rapidly, the doughty two stuck Jules against the bank at the side of theroad: the unfortunate creature had fainted. Then they took out theircigarettes, and going a few steps away, they pretended to be shelteringthemselves in order to strike a light.
They need not have taken this precaution.
The car stopped in front of them. The familiar voice of Mimile washeard:
"Got the rabbit then?"
"Yes, old 'un!"
"Pitch it into the balloon then!"
"The balloon?" questioned the Beadle. "Whatever's that?"
Emilet laughed.
"At times, my brothers, your ignorance, mechanically speaking, iscrass!... The balloon is the back part of my car, I'd have you know."
The Beard sniggered.
"Good!... Pick it up! Now, Beadle!"
The two seized the body of Jules by shoulders and feet, and flung itbrutally into the limousine.
A rug, negligently flung over the body of the trussed Jules, hid himfrom observation.
"Now we'll embark," announced Emilet.
As a precaution, the young hooligan asked:
"The bloke snores?"
"Yes," replied the Beadle. "He is travelling in No Nightmare Land...."The Beadle laughed.
But Emilet was alarmed.
"You haven't snuffed him out, have you?"
"No danger of it! He's only shamming!"
"Off, then!" said Emilet.
They rolled away at top speed.
* * * * *
The bandits' lair had been well chosen by their chiefs. It was a vastcellar, with a vaulted roof, and earthen walls bedewed with an icyhumidity. Axes, mattocks, shovels, rakes, and watering cans layscattered on the ground: these were worn out tools: they had not servedtheir purpose for many a day.
The lantern, a kind of cresset protected by a wire globe, was suspendedfrom the roof by a string. It shed a faint and wavering light, creatingweird shadows in that far-stretching space, too vast for theinsufficient illumination.
Directly beneath the cresset lantern, inside the circle of light itthrew upon the ground, a fantastic group of human creatures pressedclose to one another, drinking, shouting, chattering, singing.
A clean-shaven man, whose suspicious little eyes were perpetuallyblinking, turned to a young woman.
"Look here, Ernestine, my beauty, are you certain the Beadle understoodthat we should be waiting for him here?"
Big Ernestine, who was crouching on the ground and warming her hands ata wood fire, throwing up clouds of smoke, shrugged her shoulders.
"Stop it, do! You say things over and over again, like a clock,Nibet!... Since I've told you _yes_--_yes_ it is--there now, and behanged to you!... You don't by chance fancy the Beadle has been made amouthful of, do you?"
Roars of laughter greeted this. Nibet was not one of the inner circle;he was not much of a favourite in the band of Numbers. It is true thatthey reckoned him a comrade, useful, faithful, that they felt safe withhim; but they bore him a grudge because of his regular employment,because of his position, because he was an official.... And, first andlast, his warder's uniform impressed the jail birds unpleasantly.
But Nibet was not the man to allow himself to be intimidated.
"All the same," said he, "I ask where the three of them have got to?...If they know the mushroom bed, they should have been back long ago!" Heshouted to an old woman.
"Eh, Toulouche, tell us the time!"
But Mother Toulouche shook her head.
"I haven't a watch!"
There was a murmur of protestation. The seven or eight hooligansassembled there awaiting the return of the Beard and the Beadle, sentwith Emilet to kidnap Jules, could not believe that. Mother Toulouchehad told the truth.
The Sailor caught the old woman by the shoulders and shook her, and wenton shaking her.
"Liar! Aren't you ashamed to be in a funk with us?... Ever since thisblessed Mother Toulouche has sold winkles and many other things, eversince she began to make a little purse for herself, which must be a bigpurse by now, a purse everyone here has sweated to fill to the brim, shehas always distrusted us!... You say you haven't a watch! I tell you,you've got dozens of 'em!..."
Big Ernestine interrupted.
"It's a half-hour over the hour agreed...."
A shudder ran through the assembly: Nibet, finger on lip, made a signthat they were to listen.
Then, in the mushroom bed, no longer in use, which the band of Numbershad recently adopted as their meeting place, a profound silence fell....
"There they are!" said Nibet.
Big Ernestine leaped up, left the fire, advanced to the far end of thecellar, and imitated the cry of a screech owl to perfection. There was asimilar cry in response.
"It's all right. They're here!" she said. She returned to the fire andsat down. But Nibet seized the girl and forced her to get up again.
"Go along with you! Quick march!" he said roughly.
She protested. Nibet stopped her.
"Oh, we can't stand listening to you!... Ho there, Sailor!... Comehere!... Sit down on this plank! You, the Beadle, and me--we're to bethe judges.... Beard makes the accusation: and, if her heart tells herto, Ernestine will defend him."
"I'd rather spit at the tell-tale!... You can tear him to bits as far asI'm concerned!" cried the girl. "There's nothing disgusts me so much asa tell-tale!"
The hooligans crowded round big Ernestine. They applauded herironically; for they all knew that, once upon a time, she had beenstrongly suspected of having dealings with, what they called, "The dirtylot at the Bobby's Nest."
* * * * *
Silence fell once more. They could hear the rasp of the rope unrollingfrom a hand windlass attached to an enormous bucket. This was theprimitive lift.
Moments passed. The hooligans had formed a circle beneath the black holewhere the bucket moved up and down.
"It goes, old Beard?" questioned Nibet, gazing upwards.
"It goes, old bloke!"
"Brought the game?"
"That's what we're sending down now!..."
"That's a bit of all right!"
Sailor now seized the trussed Jules from the bucket and flung him on theground.
"Damaged goods, that--eh?" he laughed evilly.
The Beadle, Beard, and Emilet were coming down in turn. The group belowbent curiously over the prisoner.
"He's soft--that sort is!" cried Ernestine. And tapping him on the facewith her foot, big Ernestine tried to make Jules show signs of life.Beard dropped out of the bucket and stopped the game.
"Let's see, Ernestine?... Stop it now!"
After gripping the hand of each comrade in turn, after hugging a bottleand draining it in a long draught, emptying it to the dregs, Beard flungit aside.
"Let's get to work--no time to waste!... If we finish him off, we'llhave to get rid of him before morning!"
Sailor lifted Jules with the aid of two comrades. They propped himagainst a massive pillar of wood which supported the cellar roof. Theybound their wretched victim to it with strong cords.
Meanwhile, Ernestine was unwinding the gag.
"Take your places on the tribunal!" commanded Nibet.
"And you others, a glass of pick-me-up for the fellow!"
The pick-me-up intended to restore Jules to consciousness was brought byMother Toulouche, under the form of a large earthen pot full of coldwater. She dashed the water in the prisoner's face.
Jules slowly opened his eyes and regained his wits, amidst an ominoussilence. The band watched his return to life with evil smiles: theyquietly watched his pallid face turn a livid green with terror.
The wretched creature could not utter a syllable. He stared wildly atthose about him, his friends of yesterday, at those seated on the mockjudgment bench who, crouching forward, were observing him with sardonicsmiles.
Nibet put a question.
"You hear and understand us, Jules?"
"Pity!" howled the
victim.
Nibet was indifferent to the cry.
"He understands!... For my part, I am all for keeping to a properprocedure.... I would not have agreed to sit in judgment on him if hehad been unable to defend himself.... We don't act that way down here!"
Turning to his acolytes for signs of their approval, he continued:
"Beard! The word is with you! Let us hear why he has been brought up tojudgment!... Tell us what he is accused of!... Bring up all there isagainst him!"
Beard, who was marching up and down between the hooligan tribunal andthe accused, who was half dead, and incapable of making a rationalstatement, stopped, squared himself with an air of satisfaction, andbegan his speech for the prosecution.
"Jules, has anyone ever done you any harm here?... Has anyone playedcowardly tricks on you?... Set traps to catch you in?... Have you everbeen cheated out of your fair share of the spoil?... Is there anythingyou can bring up against us?... No?... Well, here's what we have againstyou ... it's not worth while lying about it either!... You are the onewho has taken the wind out of our sails over the Danidoff affair ... doyou confess that?"
In a voice barely intelligible Jules gasped out:
"Beard ... I don't understand you!... I have done nothing--nothing....What have you against me?..."
Beard took his time.
Planted before the prisoner, with hip stuck out and hand in pocket, theother hand raised in tragic invocation towards his comrades:
"You have heard?... Monsieur does not understand!... He has not thepluck to be open and aboveboard!"
Turning again to the wretched captive, he continued:
"Well, I'm going to explain ... it was you, wasn't it, who had to putthrough the robbery of the lady's jewels?... Well, do you know what youdid? Do you want me to tell you?... Instead of lending us a hand as waspromised and sworn, you kept the cake for yourself!... In other words,you, and some of your sort, serving at the ball, put your headstogether, and shut up the lady in the room they found her in; and thatway, you got out of sharing with us!... So we have been done in the eyeover that deal!... The proof that you have comrades we know nothingabout is, that yesterday when you were done in, they found a way to getyou out of the Salad Basket!... It wasn't us!... But to return to theDanidoff robbery ... oh, you must have laughed then!... But everyone hashis turn ... you are going to laugh on the wrong side of your mouthnow!... Do you know what they call it--what you've done--dared to do?"
In the same strangled voice, Jules managed to get out the words:
"But it's not true!... I swear to you ..."
Beard did not listen.
"There's not one of our lot who would give me the lie!... To behave likethat is treachery!... You have betrayed the Numbers. There it is in anutshell!... What have you to reply to that?"
For the third time, Jules repeated in a hoarse whisper, for he felt lifewas gradually leaving him: an awful fear gripped him, he saw he wascompletely done for.
"I swear I did not do that!... I didn't rob the princess.... I don'teven know who did!"
Jules was, perhaps, speaking the truth, but he took the worst way todefend himself.... If he had had pluck and wit enough to take theBeard's accusation with a high hand, if he had met threats with violentdenial and assertion, it is quite possible he might have made animpression in his favour; but he cried for pity and for mercy from menwho were pitiless!
He was afraid!... His fear was shown by the convulsive trembling whichagitated his wretched body, by his ghastly pallor, by the cold drops ofsweat rolling down his forehead.... He was no longer a man: it was alamentable bit of human wreckage the hooligans had before them!... Andthe more lamentable this wreck showed itself to be, the less worthy oftheir interest it seemed!
When Jules gasped out once again:
"I swear to you it was not I! No!... I did not do it!"
The hooligans, moved by a common impulse, rose, indignant, furious, madwith rage.
"That's a good one, that is!" yelled Nibet, who, beside himself withrage, suddenly forgot his avowed respect for judicial forms.
"Since he is determined to tell lies, and hasn't the pluck to say whathe's done, there's only one thing for us to do, and that's to stop hismouth up!... Ernestine, put the plug back!"
And as the girl once more rolled the scarf round and round the head ofthe miserable Jules, Nibet turned to his comrades.
"Now then? One hasn't any need to waste more time over it!... We knowall the story--not so?... It's settled, I tell you!... A fellow who hasdone what he has done, what does he deserve?... You answer first,Mother Toulouche, since you are the oldest?..."
Mother Toulouche stretched out a trembling hand, as though calling onHeaven to witness an oath.
"I," said the old woman, with a wicked gleam in her eyes. "I don'thesitate!... Comrades who flinch, sneaks who betray, get rid of them,say I!... I condemn him to death!..."
The old woman's sentence was greeted with loud applause.
Nibet resumed.
"It is said!... It is unanimous!... Make a quick finish, my lads!...Since each has been injured, let each take his revenge! I say: Death bythe hammer!"
In that smoke-thickened air rose a chorus of hate and of vengeance.
"Death by the hammer! Death by the hammer!"
* * * * *
In that noisome lair of the bandits a horrible scene ensued.
Mother Toulouche went groping in a dark corner. She searched for, andfound, a blacksmith's hammer. She lifted it with trembling hands, andplanting herself in front of the victim, more dead than alive, she saidin a menacing voice:
"You did harm to the Numbers! You wronged them! Here goes for thatthen!"
The hammer described a quarter of a circle in the air and descended in asmashing blow on the wretched victim's face!
The awful punishment had begun!
According to age, one after another, the hooligans passed on the hammer,and, in a blind passion of hate, beat followed beat on the agonisingbody of Jules!
At last the terrible agony was over and done! The passion of hate, thelust for revenge had burnt themselves out. Jules had expiated the crimethey had imputed to him!
The band were the victims of a paralysing fatigue. Emilet flung theblood-stained hammer into a far corner of their den.
"Well done!" said he. "He has paid the price!"
Emilet's eyes fell on Nibet. He was leaning against the wall, and, withfolded arms, was watching the scene in which he had taken no part.Walking up to the warder, Emilet demanded:
"Ho! Ho! You backed out of it, did you, my boy?... You didn't have athrow, did you?... No?..."
Nibet grinned sardonically.
"Don't talk rubbish, Emilet!... If I have stood aside, I had my reasonsfor doing so.... We haven't done with Jules yet!... Not by a longchalk!... Now that he's been killed, he's got to be got rid of--isn'tthat true?... Look at yourselves, my lambs! You are covered with red!...It will take you all of an hour to make yourselves presentable!... Now,look at me! I'm neat and clean ... and I have a plan ... a famous planto rid us of that corpse there! Now, just you stir your stumps,Emilet!... I am going off to make preparations!... I'll give you tenminutes to make yourself fit to be seen ... it's we two are to be theundertakers; and I swear to you, that we will give them no end oftrouble to the curiosity mongers at Police Headquarters!"