The door closed behind them. Daylight had not yet come, but the darkness was less profound. The traveller was surprised to see that the Companions had a prisoner with them. His hands were tied behind his back, and he was fastened to a horse which two of the Companions were leading. These three had entered first and had galloped to the end of the courtyard. Two by two the others had followed and had surrounded them. All had then dismounted. The prisoner had remained on horseback for a moment; then they had taken him down.
"Let me speak to Captain Morgan," said the traveller to the monk who had attended him. "He must know at once that I am here."
The monk went and whispered a few words in the leader's ears, who hastened to the traveller's side.
"From whom do you come?" he asked.
"Shall I use the ordinary formula," asked the traveller, "or shall I simply tell you from whom I really come?"
"Since you are here, you have probably satisfied all requirements. Tell me who sent you."
"General Roundhead."
"You have a letter from him?"
"Here it is." And the traveller put his hand to his pocket, but Morgan stopped him.
"Later," said he. "First we must try a traitor. Take the prisoner to the council-chamber," he added.
Just then they caught the gallop of a second troop of horsemen. Morgan listened attentively.
"Those are our brothers," said he; "open the door."
The door was opened.
"Draw back!" cried Morgan.
And a second company of four men entered almost as rapidly as the first.
"Have you the prisoner?" cried their leader.
"Yes," replied the Companions of Jehu with one accord.
"And you," asked Morgan, "have you the report?"
"Yes," replied the four with one voice.
"Then all is well," replied Morgan, "and justice will be done."
This is what had happened:
As we have said, several bands, known by the name of Companions of Jehu, or Avengers, and sometimes by both, scoured the country from Marseilles to Besançon. One had its headquarters in the neighborhood of Avignon, a second in the Jura, and a third, as we have seen, in the old Chartreuse of Seillon.
As all these young men belonged to families residing in the neighborhood, as soon as each undertaking was accomplished, whether or not successfully, they returned to their respective homes. A quarter of an hour later our pillager of diligences, with his hat perched over his ear, his eyeglass in his eye, and his stick in his hand, was walking through the town asking what had happened, and marvelling at the incredible insolence of these fellows to whom nothing was sacred, not even the cash of the Directory. Now, how could young men, some of whom were rich, and all of whom were connected with the ruling powers of the neighborhood, be suspected of highway robbery? Nor were they suspected—though, had they been, no one would have taken it upon himself to denounce them.
However, the government was much annoyed to see its money turned from its original destination—the coffers of the Directory at Paris—into those of the Chouans in Brittany. They therefore decided to play a trick upon their enemies.
In one of the diligences used to convey money, they placed seven or eight gendarmes dressed as citizens, who had sent their pistols and carbines beforehand to the diligence, and who had received express orders to take one of the outlaws alive. The thing had been planned so cleverly that the Companions of Jehu had heard nothing about it. The vehicle, with the modest appearance of an ordinary diligence—that is to say, filled with honest bourgeois—ventured into the pass of Cavaillon, and was stopped by eight masked men. A sharp discharge of firearms from within the coach disclosed the trick to the Companions, who, not desirous of entering into a profitless struggle, set off at a gallop, and, thanks to the excellence of their horses, soon disappeared. But one horse had his leg broken by a ball, and fell on his rider. The horseman, held down by the animal, could not escape, and the gendarmes thus fulfilled the double duty of defending the government money, and of capturing one of those who sought to lay hands on it.
Like the old free-booters, like the Illuminati of the eighteenth century, like the Freemasons of modern times, the members of this society, in order to become affiliated with it, underwent brutal tests, and took blood-curdling oaths. One of these oaths was never to betray a Companion, no matter what torture might be inflicted. If the name of a Companion escaped him, or if, weakness overcoming him, any facts escaped his lips, then the Companions, taking the place of that justice which granted mercy or softened the penalty as a reward for his treachery, had ordained that the first of their number who should meet him was justified in burying his dagger in the traitor's heart!
Now the prisoner taken on the road from Marseilles, whose assumed name was Hector and whose real name was Fargas, after having resisted promises as well as threats for a long time, finally weary of prison life, and tortured with loss of sleep—the worst of all tortures—and being known by his real name, had ended by confessing and naming his accomplices.
But as soon as this became known, the judges were overwhelmed by such a deluge of threatening letters and remarks that they resolved to conduct the trial at the other end of France, and had chosen for that purpose the little town of Nantua, at the furthest extremity of the Department of the Ain.
But at the same time that the prisoner was removed to Nantua, with every precaution taken for his safety, the Companions of Jehu at the Chartreuse of Seillon received word of the betrayal and the removal of the traitor.
"It is for you, the most devoted of our brothers," they were told—"it is for Morgan, the most venturesome and daring of us all, to save the Companions by destroying the report which accuses them, and likewise to make a terrible example of the person of the traitor. Let him be tried, condemned and executed, and exposed to the gaze of all with the avenging poniard in his breast."
This was the terrible mission which Morgan had just accomplished. He had gone with ten of his comrades to Nantua. Six of them, after having gagged the sentinel, had knocked at the prison door and forced the keeper at the pistol's point to open the gate. Once inside, they had learned which was Fargas's cell, and, accompanied by the keeper and the jailer, they had gone to it, locked in the two officials, bound the young man on a horse, which they had brought with them, and had set off at a gallop.
The other four, in the meantime, had seized the clerk, had forced him, at the dead of night, to admit them to the registry, of which he had the key, as he sometimes worked there all night, when there was great stress of business. There they had compelled him to surrender all the court records, together with the interrogatories, which contained the charges signed with the prisoner's name. Then, to save the clerk, who begged them not to ruin him, and who had perhaps not made all possible resistance, they emptied a number of boxes, set fire to them, shut the door, returned the key to the clerk, who was then free to return home, and set off at a gallop themselves with the papers in their possession.
It is needless to say that all who had taken part in this expedition had worn masks.
This is why the second troop, when they entered the courtyard of the Chartreuse, had asked: "Have you the prisoner?" and why the first troop, after replying in the affirmative, had asked: "Have you the report?" And this is also the reason why Morgan had remarked subsequently: "Then all is well, and justice will be done!"
The prisoner was a young man of twenty-two or three years of age, who resembled a woman rather than a man, so slender and fair was he. He was bareheaded and in his shirt sleeves, with pantaloons and boots. The Companion had seized him in his cell just as he was and had hurried him away without allowing him an instant's reflection.
His first thought had been that he was rescued. These men who had entered his cell were beyond question Companions of Jehu; that is to say, they were men who held the same opinions and belonged to the same band as himself. But when he found that they had bound his hands, and when he saw their eyes flashing angrily through their masks, he realized that he had fallen into hands far more terrible than those of his judges—the hands of those whom he had betrayed—and that he could hope for nothing from comrades whom he had been willing to denounce.
On the way he had not asked a single question and no one had spoken to him. The first words he heard from the lips of his judges were the ones they had just pronounced. He was very pale, but this pallor was the only sign of emotion he displayed.
At Morgan's command the pretended monks crossed thecloister. The prisoner walked first between two of them, each holding a pistol in his hand.
The cloister crossed, they passed into the garden. This procession of the twelve marching silently along in the darkness had something terrifying about it. They approached the door of the subterranean vault. One of the two who were walking with the prisoner raised a stone, disclosing a ring beneath it, by means of which he lifted a flagstone which concealed the entrance to a staircase.
The prisoner hesitated a moment, so closely did the entrance of the vault resemble that of a tomb. The two monks who walked beside him descended first; then from a groove in the stone they took two torches which had been placed there for those who might have occasion to enter the vault. They struck a light, kindled the torches, and uttered the one word: "Descend!"
The prisoner obeyed. The monks disappeared to the last man in the vault. They walked on for several moments until they reached a grating; one of the monks drew a key from his pocket and opened the grating. It led into a burial vault.
The whole subterranean chapel stood at the end of the vault, which the Companions of Jehu used for their council-chamber. A table covered with black cloth stood in the centre, and twelve carved stalls, which had formerly been used by the monks when the burial service was being chanted, extended along the wall on either side of the chapel. On the table were placed an ink-stand, several pens, and some paper; two iron brackets projected from the wall, like hands ready to receive the torches which were placed in them.
The twelve monks seated themselves in the twelve stalls. They made the prisoner sit upon a stool at the end of the table; on the other side stood the traveller, the only one who did not wear the monk's cowl and who was not masked.
Morgan spoke.
"Monsieur Lucien de Fargas," he said, "was it of yourown free will, and without constraint or force from any one, that you asked our brothers in the Midi to admit you to our association, and that you became an affiliated member thereof, after the usual initiation under the name of Hector?"
The young man bowed assent.
"It was of my own free and unrestrained will, without being forced by any one," he replied.
"You took the customary oaths, and were therefore aware of the terrible punishment awaiting those who prove false to them?"
"I knew," replied the prisoner.
"You knew that when any Companion, even under torture, reveals the names of his brethren, he incurs the death-penalty, and that this penalty is executed without reprieve or delay the moment that proof of his treachery is furnished?"
"I knew it."
"What could have induced you to break your oaths?"
"The impossibility of resisting the torture of loss of sleep. I resisted for five nights, on the sixth I asked for death, which was sleep. They would not give it to me. I sought a means to take my own life; but my jailers had taken their precautions so well that I could find none. On the seventh night I yielded. I promised to make disclosures on the morrow if they would let me sleep; but they insisted that I should speak at once. It was then in despair, insane from want of sleep, held up by the two men who prevented me from sleeping, I stammered the four names of M. de Valensolles, M. de Barjols, M. de Jayat, and M. de Ribier."
One of the monks drew from his pocket the record which they had taken from the registry, and held it before the prisoner's eyes.
"That is it," said the latter.
"And do you recognize your signature?" asked the monk.
"I recognize it," replied the young man.
"Have you any excuse to offer?" asked the monk.
"None," replied the young man. "I knew when I wrote my signature at the bottom of that page that I was signing my death-warrant. But I wanted to sleep."
"Have you any favor to ask before you die?"
"One."
"What is it?"
"I have a sister whom I love and who adores me. Being orphans, we were educated together; we grew up side by side, and have never been parted. I should like to write to my sister."
"You are free to do so. But at the end of your letter you must write the postscript that we shall dictate to you."
"Thanks," said the young man, rising and bowing.
"Will you untie my hands," he added, "so that I may write."
The wish was granted. Morgan, who had been the one to question him, pushed the paper, pen, and ink toward him. The young man wrote a page with a hand that did not tremble.
"I have finished, gentlemen," said he; "will you dictate the postscript?"
Morgan approached and laid one finger on the paper while the prisoner wrote.
"Are you ready?" he asked.
"Yes," replied the young man.
"I die because I have broken a sacred oath; consequently I acknowledge that I deserve death. If you wish to give my body Christian burial, it will be placed to-night in the market-place at Bourg. The dagger which will be found implanted in my breast will indicate that I do not die the victim of cowardly assassination, but of a just vengeance."
Morgan then drew from beneath his robe a dagger of which both handle and blade were forged from a single piece of metal. It was shaped in the form of a cross so thatthe condemned could kiss it in his last moments instead of a crucifix.
"If you wish, sir," said Morgan, "we will accord you the favor of striking your own death-blow. Here is the dagger. Is your hand sure enough?"
The young man pondered an instant. Then he said: "No, I fear that I should fail."
"Very well," said Morgan, "affix the address to your letter."
The young man folded the letter and wrote: "Mademoiselle Diane de Fargas, Nîmes."
"Now, sir," said Morgan, "you have just ten minutes in which to make your peace with God."
The old chapel altar, though mutilated, was still standing. The condemned went to it and knelt down. In the meantime the Companions tore a slip of paper into twelve parts, one of which bore the tracing of a dagger. The twelve pieces were then placed in the hat of the messenger who had arrived just in time to witness this act of vengeance. Then, before the condemned man had finished his prayers, each monk drew a slip in turn. The one to whom the function of executioner had fallen said never a word; he merely took the dagger from the table and tested the point with his finger. The ten minutes having passed, the young man rose.
"I am ready," he said.
Then without hesitation or delay, firm and erect, the monk who had drawn the fatal slip walked straight to him and plunged the dagger into his heart. A cry of agony, then the thud of a body falling upon the pavement, and all was over. The condemned man was dead, the blade of the dagger had pierced his heart.
"Thus perish all the members of our holy order who are false to their oaths," said Morgan.
And all the monks responded in chorus: "Amen!"
Just as the unfortunate Lucien de Fargas was drawing his last breath in the subterranean chapel of the Chartreuse of Seillon, a post-chaise stopped before the inn of the Dragon at Nantua. This inn of the Dragon had a certain reputation in Nantua and its suburbs, a reputation which it owed to the well-known opinions of its proprietor, René Servet.
Without knowing why, Master René Servet was a royalist. Thanks to the distance which stretched between Nantua and all the great centres of civilization, thanks also to the mild temperament of its inhabitants, Master René Servet had passed through the Revolution without being in the least molested for his opinions, well-known though they were.
It must be confessed, though, that the worthy man had done all in his power to invite persecution. Not only had he retained the name of the Dauphin for his inn, but on the tail of the fantastic fish on his sign-board, a tail which protruded insolently from the water, he had drawn the profile of the poor little prince, who had remained shut up for four years and who had died, shortly after the Thermidorean reaction, in the prison of the Temple.
Therefore all those who for sixty miles round the inn of the Dragon—and their number was great—shared the opinions of René Servet, did not fail to patronize his inn, and would not have consented to go elsewhere.
It was not astonishing, therefore, that a post-chaise having to stop at Nantua should leave its passengers rather at the aristocratic inn of the Dragon than at its democratic rival, the Boule d'Or.
At the sound of the chaise, although it was barely fivein the morning, René Servet leaped out of bed, and putting on his drawers, a pair of white stockings, list slippers, and a great bath-robe over his shoulders, and holding his cotton cap in his hand, reached the doorstep just as a beautiful young woman of twenty or thereabout descended from the chaise.
She was dressed in black, and in spite of her youth and great beauty she was travelling alone.
She replied with a nod to René Servet's obsequious salutation, and, without paying any attention to his offers of service, asked him if he had a good room in his house with a dressing-room. Master René mentioned No. 7 on the first floor as the best he had.
The young lady hastened impatiently to the wooden placard where the keys were hanging from a frame and took down her key herself.
"Sir," said she, "will you be good enough to show me to my room? I want to ask you some questions. You can send the chambermaid to me when you go down."
René Servet bowed almost to the floor and hastened to obey. He went first and the young lady followed. When they reached the room she closed the door behind them, and, as she seated herself, she addressed the landlord, who remained standing.
"Master Servet," she said with decision, "I know you both by name and reputation. Throughout the bloody years that have just elapsed you have remained a partisan, if not a defender of the good cause. Therefore I come directly to you."
"You do me honor, madame," replied the innkeeper, bowing.
She resumed: "I shall therefore abandon all circumlocution or evasion, to which I might resort with a man whose opinions were less well-known to me, or who was suspected by me. I am a royalist. That gives you a right to my confidence. I know no one here, not even the president of the tribunal, for whom I have a letter from his brother-in-law atAvignon; it is therefore perfectly natural that I should address myself to you."
"I am waiting, madame," said René Servet, "for you to do me the honor to tell me what it is that I can do for you."
"Have you heard, sir, that a young man named Lucien de Fargas was brought to the prison at Nantua a few days ago?"
"Alas! yes, madame; it seems that he is to be tried here, or rather at Bourg. He is a member, so I am told, of the secret society called the Companions of Jehu."
"Do you know the purpose of that society, sir?" asked the young woman.
"I believe that they are to seize the government money and to forward it to our friends in the Vendée and Brittany."
"Exactly, sir; and the government treats these men like ordinary thieves!"
"I believe, madame," said René Servet, in a voice full of confidence, "that our judges are sufficiently intelligent to differentiate between them and ordinary malefactors."
"But to come to the point. It was thought that my brother ran some risk in the prison at Avignon, and it was to protect him that he was removed to the other end of France. I wish to see him. To whom ought I to apply to obtain this favor?"
"Why, madame, to the very president to whom you have that letter."
"What sort of a man is he?"
"A prudent man, but well-meaning, I hope. I will have you taken to his house whenever you wish."
Mademoiselle de Fargas drew out her watch. It was scarcely half-past five in the morning.
"But I cannot present myself at such an hour," she said. "Shall I go to bed? I am not sleepy." Then, after thinking for a moment, she asked: "On what side of the town is the prison?"
"If madame would like to take a turn that way," replied Master Servet, "I would beg the honor of accompanying her."
"Very well, sir. Send me a glass of milk, coffee, tea, whatever you please, and finish your toilet. While I am waiting for leave to enter, I should like to see the walls behind which my brother is confined."
The innkeeper made no remark; the desire was a natural one. He went down and sent her in a cup of coffee and some milk. Ten minutes later she came down and found him dressed in his Sunday clothes, ready to guide her through the streets of the little town, which was founded by the Benedictine Saint-Amand, and in whose church Charles the Bold sleeps more tranquilly than ever he did in life.
The town of Nantua is not large. A five minutes' walk brought them to the prison, where they found a crowd full of excitement.
Everything arouses foreboding in the minds of those whose friends are in danger. Mademoiselle de Fargas had more than a friend—an adored brother, who was lying in prison, charged with a capital offence. It seemed to her that her brother must be involved in the excitement which had caused the crowd to assemble. Growing pale, she seized the guide's arm, crying: "Oh! my God! what has happened?"
"We shall soon see, mademoiselle," replied René Servet, much less easily moved than his companion.
No one knew positively what had happened. When they had come to relieve the sentinel at two o'clock they had found him gagged and bound hand and foot in his box. All that he could tell was that he had been surprised by four men, and that he had offered a desperate resistance, which had ended in their leaving him in the state in which his comrades had found him. He could give no information concerning what had passed after he had been bound and gagged. He believed, however, that the prisoner had been the object of the attack. The mayor,the commissioner of police, and the fireman's sergeant had then been notified of what had occurred. These three digitaries had then held council, had summoned the sentinel before them, and there he had repeated the same story.
After a half hour of deliberation and surmises, each one more ridiculous than its predecessor, they resolved to end where they ought to have begun, by going to the prison. But, in spite of prolonged knocking, no one came to admit them. But the strokes of the knocker aroused the people in the adjacent houses. They came to the windows, and a series of questions and answers passed, which resulted in a locksmith being sent for.
In the meantime the dawn had come, several dogs began to bark, and the occasional passers-by had grouped themselves round the mayor and the police commissioner; and when the sergeant returned with a locksmith, about four o'clock in the morning, he found quite a crowd gathered in front of the prison doors. The locksmith remarked that if the doors were bolted on the inside all the picklocks in the world would be of no avail. But the mayor, a man of great good sense, ordered him to try first, and if he failed they could devise some other means later. Now, as the Companions of Jehu had been unable to close the door on the outside and to bolt it on the inside at one and the same time, they had simply pulled it to after them; and to the great satisfaction of everybody the door had opened at once.
Then everybody tried to rush into the prison; but the mayor placed the sergeant on guard before the door, with orders to keep them all out. They had to obey the law. The crowd increased, but the mayor's order was respected.
There are not many cells in the prison of Nantua; they consist of three subterranean chambers, in one of which they could hear groans. These groans attracted the attention of the mayor, who interrogated those who were making them through the door, and soon found that they were none other than the doorkeeper and the jailer themselves.
They had proceeded thus far with the municipal investigation, when Diane de Fargas and the landlord of the inn of the Dragon arrived in the square before the prison.
To Master René's first question, "For heaven's sake! what is going on in the prison, friend Bodoux?" the person thus addressed replied:
"The most extraordinary things that were ever known, Monsieur Servet! When they came to relieve the sentinel this morning, they found him gagged and tied up like a sausage; and just now it seems that they have found Père Rossignol and his turnkey shut up in a cell. What times we live in, good Lord! What times we live in!"
From the very grotesqueness of the reply, Diane saw that he was telling the truth. It was clear to any intelligent person that if the jailer and the turnkey were inside, the prisoner must be outside.
Diane dropped Master René's arm, darted through the crowd, made her way toward the prison, and finally reached the door.
Here she heard some one say: "The prisoner has escaped!"
At the same time, Père Rossignol and the turnkey appeared within the jail, having been released from the cell in the first place by the locksmith, who had opened the door, and in the second place by the mayor and the police commissioner, who had unbound them.
"You cannot pass," said the sergeant to Diane.
"That order may apply to every one else," said Diane, "but not to me. I am the sister of the escaped prisoner."
This reasoning was not very conclusive in point of law,but it carried with it the logic of the heart, which few men can resist.
"Oh! that is another thing," said the sergeant, lifting his sword. "Pass on, mademoiselle!"
And Diane passed in, to the great astonishment of the crowd, who saw the curtain rising upon a new phase of the drama, and muttered: "It is the prisoner's sister!"
Now everybody in Nantua knew who the prisoner was, and for what cause he was imprisoned.
Père Rossignol and the turnkey were at first in such a state of terror and prostration that neither the mayor nor the police commissioner could get anything out of them. Fortunately the latter bethought him of the idea of giving them each a glass of wine, which enabled the former to relate how six masked men had forced an entrance into the prison, had compelled him and the turnkey Rigobert to go down to the cell with them, and after making sure of the prisoner, who had arrived two days before, had locked them up in his place. Since then they did not know what had happened.
This was all that Diane cared to know for the moment. Convinced that her brother had been taken away by the Companions of Jehu, since Père Rossignol described his assailants as masked men, she hastened from the jail. But she was at once surrounded by an eager crowd, who, having heard that she was the prisoner's sister, wanted to hear the details of his escape.
In a few words Diane told them all she knew, and with great difficulty she rejoined Master René Servet. She was about to give him the order for post-horses to start at once when she heard a man shout that the registry was on fire—a piece of news destined to share the attention of the crowd with that of the prisoner's escape.
Indeed, they had learned almost all that was to be learned, when this unexpected news opened up a new field of conjecture. It was almost certain that there must be some connection between the prisoner's escape and thefire at the registry. The young girl believed this to be the case. The order to put horses to the chaise died upon her lips, for she felt that this fire would furnish her with further details concerning her brother's escape which might be useful to her.
Time had been speeding on during this investigation. It was now eight o'clock in the morning. This was the time to present herself at the magistrate's house to whom she had the letter. Moreover, the extraordinary events of which the little town of Nantua had been the scene would explain this early visit, especially from the prisoner's sister. Diane, therefore, begged her landlord to take her to Monsieur Pérignon; for such was the name of the president of the tribunal.
Monsieur Pérignon had been one of the first to be awakened by the news which had thrown all Nantua into a turmoil. But he had hurried to the spot in which he, as a judge, was particularly interested; that is to say, to the registry. He had just returned when Mademoiselle de Fargas was announced.
When he reached the office the fire had been extinguished; but it had already consumed a portion of the papers which had been deposited there for safe-keeping. He had questioned the porter, who told him that the clerk had come to the office about half-past eleven with two gentlemen, and that he, the porter, had not thought it necessary to investigate, inasmuch as the clerk frequently came there in the evening to procure papers which he engrossed at home.
Scarcely had the clerk taken his departure when he had noticed a bright light through the windows of the office. Not understanding what it could mean, he had risen and gone in. There he had found a great fire, lighted in such a way that it would spread along the wooden cases which lined the wall, and which contained boxes of documents. He had not lost his head, but had separated the burning papers from the ones which the fire had as yet left untouched, and had succeeded in extinguishing it by bringing water in dippers from a tub in the cellar.
The worthy porter had gone no further in his calculations than to ascribe it to an accident; but as the flames had done some mischief, and he, by his presence of mind, had prevented still greater damage, he had told everybody about it in the morning when he awoke. As it was to his interest to enlarge upon the occurrence, by seven in the morning the rumor was current throughout the town that, had it not been for his great courage, the fire, which had burned his clothes off of his back, would have destroyed not only the registry but also the entire court house.
Monsieur Pérignon, on seeing the state of the registry office, had thought very sensibly that the best way to obtain information was to see the clerk himself. Consequently, he went to his house and asked to see him. He was told that during the night the clerk had been attacked with brain fever, and raved continuously of masked men, stolen papers, and burning records.
When he saw Monsieur Pérignon, the clerk's terror reached its climax; but believing that it would be wiser to tell all than to invent a fable that would only serve to make him suspected of complicity with the incendiaries, he fell at Monsieur Pérignon's feet and confessed all. The coincidence between the events of the night left no doubt in the magistrate's mind that they were a part of the same plot, and were intended to achieve the double purpose of carrying off both the guilty man and the proof of his guilt.
The presence of the prisoner's sister in his house, and her story of what had passed, left no room for doubt, even had he been in doubt. These masked men had come to Nantua with the intention of abducting Lucien de Fargas and the report of the prosecution, which had begun against him. Now for what purpose had the prisoner been abducted?
In the sincerity of her heart Diane did not doubt that her brother's companions, moved by generosity, had united, and had risked their own heads to save his.
But Monsieur Pérignon, whose mind was cold and logical, was not of the same opinion. He knew the actual reason for the prisoner's removal to Nantua; and that, having informed against some of his accomplices, he had since become an object of vengeance to the Companions of Jehu. Thus his opinion inclined him to the belief that, far from aiding him to escape from prison in order to restore his liberty, they had taken him away only to punish him more cruelly than the law would have done. The important thing, therefore, was to ascertain whether they had taken the road to Geneva or had returned to the interior of the department.
If they had taken the road to Geneva, thereby placing themselves beyond the frontier, it would prove that they had intended to save Lucien de Fargas and their own lives as well. If they had, on the contrary, gone into the interior of the department, it would be because they felt themselves strong enough to defy justice twice over—not only as highwaymen but as murderers.
At this suggestion, which came to her for the first time, Diane turned, and seizing Monsieur Pérignon's hand, cried: "Monsieur, monsieur! do you think they would dare commit such a crime?"
"The Companions of Jehu would dare anything, mademoiselle," replied the judge; "particularly that which one would suppose a crime they would not dare attempt."
"But," said Diane, trembling with terror, "how can we learn whether they have gone to the frontier or returned to the interior of France?"
"Oh! as to that, nothing is easier," replied the judge. "This is market-day, and ever since midnight the roads have been crowded with peasants who have been bringing their produce to market with their carts and donkeys. Ten men on horseback, accompanied by a prisoner, could never have passed unnoticed. We must find some people coming from Saint-Germain and Chérizy, and ask them if they saw such a party going in the direction of the Gex country; andthen we must find others who come from Vollognas and Peyriat, and find out whether they have seen a party of horsemen going toward Bourg."
Diane was so urgent, she laid so much stress upon the letter which Monsieur Pérignon's brother-in-law had given her to him, and, moreover, her situation as the sister of the man whose life was at stake aroused so much sympathy, that the magistrate consented to accompany her to the market-place.
There they learned that some horsemen had been seen on their way to Bourg.
Diane thanked Monsieur Pérignon, went to the Dauphin, ordered horses to be made ready, and started immediately for Bourg. There she alighted on the Place de la Prefecture, at the Hôtel des Grottes de Ceyzeriat, which had been recommended to her by Master René Servet.
Day was breaking when Lucien de Fargas suffered the penalty to which he had condemned himself, when, on entering the Society of Jehu, he had sworn on his life never to betray his companions. It was impossible, on that day at least, to expose his body publicly as proposed. Its removal to the Place de la Prefecture at Bourg was therefore postponed until the following night.
On leaving the underground vault, Morgan turned to the messenger and said:
"Sir, you have seen what has just passed, you know with whom you are, and we have treated you like a brother. If it is your pleasure that we should prolong this session, and you desire to take leave of us, fatigued as we are, we will acquiesce and give you your liberty unconditionally. If, however, you do not intend to leave us until night, and ifthe affair on which you have come is of great importance, grant us a few hours' sleep. Take some rest yourself, for you do not seem to have slept any more than we have. At noon, if you will remain so long, the council will hear you; and if my memory does not play me false, after having parted at our last meeting as companions-in-arms, we will part this time as friends."
"Gentlemen," said the messenger, "I was with you in heart long before I set foot in your domains. The oath which I shall take can add nothing, I trust, to the confidence which you have already reposed in me. At noon, if you please, I will present my letters of introduction to you."
Morgan shook hands with the messenger. Then, retracing their steps, the pretended monks returned through the underground passage, which they closed, carefully concealing the ring as before. They crossed the garden, skirted the cloister, re-entered the Chartreuse, and disappeared silently through different doors.
The younger of the two monks who had received the traveller remained with him, and showed him to his room, after which he bowed and withdrew. The guest of the Companions of Jehu noted with pleasure that he did not lock the door behind him. He went to the window, which opened from within, had no bars, and was almost on a level with the garden. The Companions of Jehu had evidently trusted him and had taken no precautions against him. He drew the curtains of his bed, threw himself upon it all dressed as he was, and slept. At noon he was awakened by the opening of the door. The young monk entered.
"It is noon, brother," said he: "but if you are weary and wish to sleep longer the council will wait."
The messenger sprang from the bed, took a brush and comb from his valise, brushed his hair, combed his moustache, glanced over his attire, and signed to the monk that he was ready to follow him. He was led to the hall where he had supped. Four young men awaited him, all of whom were unmasked.
It was evident from their attire, the care which they had bestowed upon their toilet, and the refined courtesy of their greeting, that they belonged all four to the aristocracy, either by birth or fortune.
Had the messenger not detected this of himself, he had not been left long in doubt.
"Monsieur," said Morgan, "I have the honor of presenting to you the four chiefs of the society, Monsieur de Valensolle, Monsieur de Jayat, Monsieur de Ribier, and myself, the Comte de Sainte-Hermine. Monsieur de Valensolle, Monsieur de Jayat, Monsieur de Ribier, I have the honor of presenting to you Monsieur Coster de Saint-Victor, a messenger from General Georges Cadoudal."
The five young men bowed and exchanged the customary greetings.
"Gentlemen," said Coster de Saint-Victor, "it is by no means surprising that Monsieur Morgan should know my name, or that he should not hesitate to tell me your names, since we fought in the same ranks on the 13th Vendémiaire. That is why we were companions before we were friends. As Monsieur le Comte de Sainte-Hermine has said, I come from General Cadoudal, with whom I serve in Brittany. Here is the letter which accredits me to you."
At these words Coster drew from his pocket a letter bearing a seal stamped with the fleur-de-lis, and handed it to the Comte de Sainte-Hermine. The latter broke the seal and read aloud:
My dear Morgan—You will remember that at our meeting in the Rue des Postes, you were the first to offer, in case I should carry on the war alone, and without help either from home or abroad, to be my cashier. All our defenders have died with arms in their hands or have been shot. Stofflet and Charette have been shot, D'Autichamp has submitted to the Republic; I stand alone, unshaken in my faith, unassailable in my Morbihan.An army of two or three thousand men will suffice to keep the field; but I must furnish arms, food, and ammunition for them, as they ask no pay. The English have sent us nothing since Quiberon.If you will furnish the money, we will furnish the blood. God forbid that you should think that I mean by this that you would be sparing of yours when occasion offers. No, your devotion is so much greater than ours that ours grows pale before it. If we, who are fighting here, should be taken, we would only be shot, whereas you, in like circumstances, would die upon the scaffold. You write me that you have a considerable sum at my disposal. If I could be sure of receiving thirty-five or forty thousand francs every month that would suffice.I send you our common friend, Coster de Saint-Victor; his name alone will tell you that you may have perfect confidence in him. I have given him the little catechism that will enable him to reach you. Give him the first forty thousand francs if you have them, and keep the rest for us; it will be safer in your hands than in mine. If you are persecuted beyond measure yonder, cross France and join me.Far and near, I love and thank you.Georges Cadoudal,General-in-chief of the Army of Brittany.P.S.—They tell me, my dear Morgan, that you have a young brother of nineteen or twenty. If you do not think me unworthy to teach him his first lessons in warfare, send him to me; he shall be my aide-de-camp.
My dear Morgan—You will remember that at our meeting in the Rue des Postes, you were the first to offer, in case I should carry on the war alone, and without help either from home or abroad, to be my cashier. All our defenders have died with arms in their hands or have been shot. Stofflet and Charette have been shot, D'Autichamp has submitted to the Republic; I stand alone, unshaken in my faith, unassailable in my Morbihan.
An army of two or three thousand men will suffice to keep the field; but I must furnish arms, food, and ammunition for them, as they ask no pay. The English have sent us nothing since Quiberon.
If you will furnish the money, we will furnish the blood. God forbid that you should think that I mean by this that you would be sparing of yours when occasion offers. No, your devotion is so much greater than ours that ours grows pale before it. If we, who are fighting here, should be taken, we would only be shot, whereas you, in like circumstances, would die upon the scaffold. You write me that you have a considerable sum at my disposal. If I could be sure of receiving thirty-five or forty thousand francs every month that would suffice.
I send you our common friend, Coster de Saint-Victor; his name alone will tell you that you may have perfect confidence in him. I have given him the little catechism that will enable him to reach you. Give him the first forty thousand francs if you have them, and keep the rest for us; it will be safer in your hands than in mine. If you are persecuted beyond measure yonder, cross France and join me.
Far and near, I love and thank you.
Georges Cadoudal,
General-in-chief of the Army of Brittany.
P.S.—They tell me, my dear Morgan, that you have a young brother of nineteen or twenty. If you do not think me unworthy to teach him his first lessons in warfare, send him to me; he shall be my aide-de-camp.
Morgan stopped reading and looked questioningly at his companions. Each one nodded affirmatively.
"Will you intrust me with the reply, gentlemen?" asked Morgan.
The question was received with a unanimous "Yes." Whereupon Morgan took up his pen, and wrote while Monsieur de Valensolle, Monsieur de Jayat, Monsieur de Ribier, and Coster de Saint-Victor were talking in an embrasure of the window. Five minutes later he called Coster de Saint-Victor and his three companions and read them the following letter:
My dear General—We have received your kind and noble letter by your brave and excellent messenger. We have about a hundred and fifty thousand francs in hand, and are therefore prepared to do as you request. Our newassociate, to whom I have on my own authority given the name of Alcibiades, will start this evening, taking with him the first forty thousand francs.Every month you will be able to procure the forty thousand francs at the same bank. In case of our death or dispersion, the money will be divided and buried in as many different places as we have times forty thousand francs. Subjoined you will find a list of the names of those who will know what the sums are and where they will be deposited.Brother Alcibiades came just in time to be present at an execution; he has seen how we punish a traitor.I thank you, my dear general, for your very kind offer to my brother, but I intend to keep him out of danger until he may be called upon to take my place. My elder brother was shot, bequeathing to me the duty of avenging his death. I shall probably die upon the scaffold, and I shall die bequeathing a similar duty to my brother. He in his turn will enter the road that we have trodden; and he will contribute to the good cause as we have done, or will die as we shall. No less powerful a motive could induce me, while asking your friendship for him, to deprive him of your immediate protection.Send us again, as soon as you can spare him, our beloved brother Alcibiades; we shall be doubly glad to send you the message by such a messenger.Morgan.
My dear General—We have received your kind and noble letter by your brave and excellent messenger. We have about a hundred and fifty thousand francs in hand, and are therefore prepared to do as you request. Our newassociate, to whom I have on my own authority given the name of Alcibiades, will start this evening, taking with him the first forty thousand francs.
Every month you will be able to procure the forty thousand francs at the same bank. In case of our death or dispersion, the money will be divided and buried in as many different places as we have times forty thousand francs. Subjoined you will find a list of the names of those who will know what the sums are and where they will be deposited.
Brother Alcibiades came just in time to be present at an execution; he has seen how we punish a traitor.
I thank you, my dear general, for your very kind offer to my brother, but I intend to keep him out of danger until he may be called upon to take my place. My elder brother was shot, bequeathing to me the duty of avenging his death. I shall probably die upon the scaffold, and I shall die bequeathing a similar duty to my brother. He in his turn will enter the road that we have trodden; and he will contribute to the good cause as we have done, or will die as we shall. No less powerful a motive could induce me, while asking your friendship for him, to deprive him of your immediate protection.
Send us again, as soon as you can spare him, our beloved brother Alcibiades; we shall be doubly glad to send you the message by such a messenger.
Morgan.
The letter was approved by all, folded, sealed, and then given to Coster de Saint-Victor.
At midnight the great portal of the Chartreuse opened to permit two horsemen to pass out. One, the bearer of the letter to Cadoudal, together with the desired sum, took the road to Mâcon. The other, carrying the corpse of Lucien de Fargas, was on his way to the Place de la Prefecture at Bourg.
In the breast of the corpse was the knife with which he had been killed; and attached to the handle by a thread was the letter which the condemned man had written just before his death.
It is now necessary that our readers should learn who was the unfortunate young man whose body had been placed upon the Place de la Prefecture, and also who the young woman was who had alighted at the Hôtel des Grottes de Ceyzeriat in the same square.
They were the last remaining scions of an old family of Provence. Their father, formerly a colonel and Chevalier de Saint-Louis, was born in the same town as Barras, with whom he had been intimate in his youth; namely, Fos-Emphoux. An uncle who had died at Avignon, making him his heir, had left him a house in that city. Thither he went in 1787, with his children, Lucien and Diane. Lucien at that time was twelve and Diane eight. That was the time of early revolutionary ardor, hopeful or fearful, as one was either a patriot or a royalist.
To those who are acquainted with Avignon, there were then in that city, as there are now and always have been, two cities in one—the Roman city and the French city.
There was the papal city, with its magnificent papal palace, its hundred churches, each more splendid than the other, and its innumerable bells, always ready to sound the tocsin of incendiarism or the knell of murder.
The French city, with its Rhone, its silk manufactories, and its crossroads going from north to south, from east to west, from Lyons to Marseilles, from Nîmes to Turin—the French city, the accursed city, longing for a king, jealous of its liberties, shuddering beneath the yoke of vassalage, a vassalage with the clergy for its lord.
The clergy—not the clergy as it has been from all times in the Gallican church, and such as we see it to-day, pious, tolerantly austere in its duties, living in the world to console and edify it, without mingling in its passions and itsjoys; but the clergy such as cupidity and intrigue had made it, with its court abbés, rivalling the Roman abbé's, idle, elegant, licentious, kings of fashion, autocrats of the salon, frequenters of houses of ill-fame. Do you want a type of these abbés? Take the Abbé Maury, proud as a duke, insolent as a lackey, son of a shoemaker, more aristocratic than the son of a great lord.
We have said, Avignon, Roman city; let us add, Avignon, city of hatreds. The heart of the child, born elsewhere free from the taint of hate, came into the world in the midst of hereditary hatred, bequeathed from father to son, and from son to son in turn, a diabolical inheritance for his children. In such a city every one was forced to make definite choice, and act a part in accordance with the importance of his position.
The Comte de Fargas had been a royalist before coming to Avignon. When he settled there, in order to meet his equals he was forced to become a fanatic. From that time he was looked upon as one of the royalist leaders and one of the standard-bearers of religion.
The time of which we are speaking was, as we have said, the year '87, the dawn of our independence. And so, at the first cry of liberty which was uttered in France, the French city rose full of joy and hope. The moment had come for her to contest aloud the concession made by a young queen under age, of a city, a province, and half a million souls, in order to atone for her crimes. By what right had she sold these souls forever to a foreign master?
All France hastened to the Champ de Mars, to meet in the fraternal embrace of the Federation. All Paris had labored to prepare that immense piece of ground; where sixty-seven years after the time of this fraternal embrace it was to invite all Europe to the Universal Exposition—the triumph of peace and industry over war. Avignon alone was excluded from this great love-feast; Avignon alone had no part in this universal communion. Was not Avignon, then, a part of France?
Avignon named deputies who went to the papal legate and gave him twenty-four hours in which to leave the city. During the night the Roman party, with the Comte de Fargas at its head, by way of revenge, amused itself by hanging a manikin wearing the tri-colored cockade.
It is possible to direct the course of the Rhone, to canal the Durance, to dam up the fierce torrents which, on the melting of the winter's snow, precipitate themselves in liquid avalanches from the peaks of Mont Ventoux; but this terrible living flood, this human torrent which rushed through the steep incline of the streets of Avignon, when once loosed, once launched on its way, heaven itself put forth no hand to stay its course.
At sight of the manikin with the national colors dangling at the end of a cord, the French city rose upon its very foundations with shrieks of rage. The Comte de Fargas, who knew his Avignonese, retired, on the night of this clever expedition which he had led, to the house of one of his friends in the valley of the Vaucluse. Four of his retainers, who were rightly suspected of having taken part in this expedition, were torn from his home and strung up in the manikin's stead. In order to accomplish this they seized ropes forcibly from a worthy man named Lescuyer, who was afterward falsely accused by the royalists of having volunteered to furnish them. This occurred on the 11th of June, 1790.
The French city as a unit wrote to the National Assembly and gave itself to France, and with itself its Rhone, its commerce, the Midi, and the half of Provence. The National Assembly, was in one of its reactionary moods; it did not wish to quarrel with the pope, and it temporized with the king; the matter was therefore postponed.
From that moment the patriotic movement in Avignon became a revolt, and the pope was empowered to punish and repress. Pope Pius VI. ordered the annulment of all that had been done in the Comtat-Venaissin, and the reestablishment of the privileges of the nobles and the clergy,and also that of the Inquisition in all its rigor. The Comte de Fargas returned triumphantly to Avignon, and not only no longer concealed the fact that he had strung up the manikin with the tri-colored cockade, but even boasted of it. No one dared to say anything. The pontifical decrees were posted.
One man, one only, dared, in open day, in the sight of all, to go straight to the wall on which the decree was affixed and tear it down. His name was Lescuyer. He was the man who had already been accused of furnishing ropes to hang the royalists. It will be remembered that he had been wrongfully accused. He was not a young man, and he therefore had not been swayed by the passions of youth. No, he was almost an old man, and not even a native of the country. He was a Frenchman of Picardy, impulsive and reflective at the same time. He was a notary, who had long been established at Avignon. This act of his was a crime at which all Roman Avignon trembled—a crime so great that the Virgin wept over it.
You see, Avignon is already Italy; it must have its miracles at any cost, and if Heaven would not provide them, some one would be found to invent them. This particular miracle occurred in the church of the Cordeliers. The crowd flocked thither.
A report was started at the same time which brought the excitement to a climax. A large chest, tightly sealed, had been carried through the city. This chest had excited the curiosity of the people of Avignon. What did it contain? Two hours later it was no longer one chest, but eighteen, which had been seen going in the direction of the Rhone. As for their contents, a porter had revealed that they were the treasures of the Mont-de-Piété which the French party were carrying with them in their departure from Avignon. The treasures of the Mont-de-Piété—that is to say, the possessions of the poor! The more wretched a city the richer its pawnshops. Few cities could boast such wealth in their pawnshops as couldAvignon. This was no longer a matter of political opinion, it was a theft, an infamous theft. Whites and Blues, or, in other words, royalists and patriots, rushed to the church of the Cordeliers, not to see the miracle, but to shout that the municipality should answer to them for this crime.
Monsieur de Fargas was naturally at the head of those who shouted the loudest.
Now Lescuyer, the man of the ropes, the patriot who had torn down the decrees of the Holy Father, the quondam Picard notary, was secretary to the municipality. His name was thrown to the crowds as not only having participated in the crimes already mentioned, but as having signed the order to the keeper at the Mont-de-Piété to allow the property to be taken away.
Four men were sent out to seize Lescuyer and to bring him to the church. They found him in the street on his way to the municipality. The four men threw themselves upon him, and amid ferocious cries they dragged him to the church.
In the church, Lescuyer realized from the flaming eyes fixed upon him, the outstretched hands which menaced him, and the cries demanding his death, that he was in one of those circles of hell forgotten by Dante. His only idea was that this hatred was inspired because of the ropes which had been taken forcibly from his shop, and the destruction of the pontifical decrees.
He ascended the pulpit, thinking to convert it into a tribunal of justice, and in the voice of a man who is not only not ashamed of what he has done, but who would repeat it, he began: "Citizens, I believed the Revolution necessary, and I have acted accordingly."
The Whites knew that if Lescuyer, whose death they desired, should explain, Lescuyer was saved. That was not what they wanted. Obeying a sign from the Comte de Fargas, they threw themselves upon him, tore him from the pulpit, and thrust him into the midst of the howling mob, which dragged him toward the altar, uttering that terrible cry, which combines the hiss of the serpent and the roar of the tiger—that murderous "Zou! zou! zou!" peculiar to the populace of Avignon.
Lescuyer knew that sinister cry. He tried to take refuge at the foot of the altar. He fell there. A laborer, armed with a club, dealt him such a blow on the head that the weapon was broken in two.
Then they flung themselves upon the poor body, and with that awful mixture of ferocity and gayety peculiar to Southern people, the men sang as they danced upon his body, while the women, that he might the more fitly atone for the blasphemies which he had uttered against the pope, cut off his lips, or rather scalloped them with their scissors. Then from the midst of that terrible group came a cry, or rather a death-rattle. It said: "In the name of Heaven, in the name of the Virgin, in the name of humanity, kill me at once!"
This groan was heard and understood. With one accord the crowd drew back. They left the wretched, mangled, bleeding man to taste his death-agony. It lasted five hours, during which, amid bursts of laughter, jeers, insults and mockeries, the poor body lay quivering on the steps of the altar. That is how they kill at Avignon.
Stay, and you will see that there is still another way.
While Lescuyer was undergoing his mortal agony, it occurred to one of the French party to go to the Mont-de-Piété (a thing they might well have done at first), to see if the story of the theft were true. He found everything in order there; not the smallest article had been removed.
It was therefore not as an accomplice of theft, but as a patriot, that Lescuyer had been murdered.
There was at that time a man in Avignon who ruled the destinies of that party which in times of revolution is neither white nor blue, but blood-hued. All these terrible leaders of the South have acquired such fatal celebrity that it suffices to name them for every one, even the least educated, to recognize them. This was the famous Jourdan. Braggart and liar, he had made the common people believe that it was he who had cut off the head of the governor of the Bastille; and so they called him "Jourdan Coupe-Tête." This was not his real name; it was Mathieu Jouve. He was not a Provençal; he came from Puy-en-Velay. He had once been a muleteer on the steep heights which surrounded his native town; afterward he became a soldier, without seeing war (war might have perhaps humanized him), then an innkeeper at Paris. At Avignon he dealt in madder.
He assembled three hundred men, took possession of the gates of the city, left half his troops there, and with the rest marched upon the church of the Cordeliers, preceded by two pieces of artillery. He set the battery up in front of the church and fired at random. The assassins dispersed like a flock of frightened birds, some escaping through the windows, others by way of the sacristy, leaving several dead upon the church steps. Jourdan and his men stepped over these corpses and entered the sacred precincts.
There was nothing there save the statue of the Virgin and the unfortunate Lescuyer. He was still breathing, and when they asked him who had assassinated him, he gave the name, not of those who had dealt the blows, but of the man who had given the order to strike.
It was the Comte de Fargas.
Jourdan and his men were careful not to despatch the dying man, for his agony was a most potent means of exciting the people. They took this remnant of pulsating life, which was three-fourths dead, and carried it along, bleeding, panting, with the death-rattle in its throat. They shouted: "Fargas! Fargas! We must have Fargas!"
Every one fled at the sight, shutting doors and windows. At the end of an hour Jourdan and his men were masters of the city. Lescuyer died, and no one knew when he drew his last breath; but it mattered little, for they no longer needed his agony.
Jourdan took advantage of the terror he had inspired; and in order to assure the victory to his party, he arrested, or had arrested, eighty persons, assassins or alleged assassins, of Lescuyer, and, in consequence, accomplices of Fargas. As for the latter, he was not arrested as yet; but they were sure that he would be, since all the gates of the city were carefully guarded and the Comte de Fargas was known to everybody.
Of the eighty persons arrested, more than thirty had not even set foot within the church; but when chance affords such an excellent opportunity of ridding one's self of enemies, it should be accepted. These eighty persons were thrust into the Trouillasse Tower.
This was the tower in which the Inquisition was wont to put its victims to the torture. The greasy soot from the funereal pyre which consumed human flesh can still be seen to this very day along the walls, and also all the implements of torture, which have been carefully preserved—the caldron, the oven, the wooden horses, the chains, the oubliettes, yes, even to the old bones—nothing is wanting.
It was in this tower, built by Clement IV., that they confined the eighty prisoners. When they were safely lodged there, their captors were much embarrassed.
Who should try them? There were no legally appointed courts save those of the pope. Should they kill these wretches as they had killed Lescuyer? As we have said, there was at least a third of them, possibly half, who not only had taken no part in the assassination, but who had not even set foot in the church. To make an end of them was the only safe way; the slaughter would pass under the head of reprisals.
But executioners were needed to kill these eighty people.
A sort of tribunal organized by Jourdan sat in one of the halls of the palace. They had a clerk named Raphel; a president, half Italian, half French, an orator in the popular dialect, named Barbe Savournin de la Roua; then there were three or four poor devils, a baker, a charcoal-burner (their names have been lost, because they were of low estate). These were the ones who exclaimed: "We must kill them all! If any escape they will bear witness against us."
Executioners were wanting; there were scarcely twenty men in the courtyard, all belonging to the lowest classes in Avignon—a wig-maker, a women's-shoemaker, a cobbler, a mason, a carpenter, all with weapons caught up at haphazard. One had a sword, another a bayonet, this one a bar of iron, that one a piece of wood that had been hardened in the fire. They were all shivering in a fine October rain. It would be difficult to make assassins of such creatures. Nonsense! is there anything difficult for the devil? There is a moment in such events when Providence seems to abandon its followers; then it is Satan's turn.
Satan in person entered this cold and muddy court disguised in the appearance, form and face of an apothecary of the neighborhood, named Mende. He set up a table, lighted by two lanterns. Upon it he placed glasses, pitchers, jugs, and bottles. What was the infernal beverage that was contained in these mysterious receptacles? No one knows; but its effect is well-known. All those who drank of that diabolical liquor were seized with a sudden fever that raged through their veins—the lust of blood and murder. After that they needed only to be shown the door, and they hurled themselves into the cells.
The massacre lasted all night. All night cries, shrieks and moans echoed through the darkness. They killed them all, men and women. It took a long time, for, as we have said, the executioners were drunk and poorly armed. However, the task was finished after a time. As soon as the victims were killed they were thrown, dead and wounded together, into the pit of the Trouillasse Tower, a distanceof some sixty feet down. The men were thrown first, and then the women. At nine o'clock in the morning, after the massacre had lasted twelve hours, a voice cried out from the depths of the sepulchre: "For God's sake, come and finish me!"
One man, the armorer Bouffier, leaned over the hole; the others did not dare.
"Who called?" they asked him.
"It was Lami," he replied, drawing back.
"Well," asked the assassins, "what do you see down there?"
"A queer marmalade," he replied; "all pell-mell, men and women, priests and pretty girls. It is enough to make one die of laughing."
At that moment cries of grief and shouts of triumph made themselves heard, and the name of Fargas was repeated by a thousand voices. It was indeed the count whom they were bringing to Jourdan Coupe-Tête. He had just been found hidden in a cask in the Hôtel Palais-Royal. He was half naked, and covered with such immense quantities of blood that they did not know but what he would fall dead when they loosened their grip.