Bab Bab 27 · THE SPADASSINICIDES

. THE SPADASSINICIDES

After an absence of rather more than a week, M. le Marquis de La Tour

d’Azyr was back in his place on the Cote Droit of the National Assembly.

Properly speaking, we should already at this date allude to him as the

ci-devant Marquis de La Tour d’Azyr, for the time was September of 1790,

two months after the passing--on the motion of that downright Breton

leveller, Le Chapelier--of the decree that nobility should no more be

hereditary than infamy; that just as the brand of the gallows must not

defile the possibly worthy descendants of one who had been convicted

of evil, neither should the blazon advertising achievement glorify the

possibly unworthy descendants of one who had proved himself good. And so

the decree had been passed abolishing hereditary nobility and consigning

family escutcheons to the rubbish-heap of things no longer to be

tolerated by an enlightened generation of philosophers. M. le Comte de

Lafayette, who had supported the motion, left the Assembly as plain M.

Motier, the great tribune Count Mirabeau became plain M. Riquetti, and

M. le Marquis de La Tour d’Azyr just simple M. Lesarques. The thing was

done in one of those exaltations produced by the approach of the great

National Festival of the Champ de Mars, and no doubt it was thoroughly

repented on the morrow by those who had lent themselves to it. Thus,

although law by now, it was a law that no one troubled just yet to

enforce.

That, however, is by the way. The time, as I have said, was September,

the day dull and showery, and some of the damp and gloom of it seemed to

have penetrated the long Hall of the Manege, where on their eight rows

of green benches elliptically arranged in ascending tiers about

the space known as La Piste, sat some eight or nine hundred of the

representatives of the three orders that composed the nation.

The matter under debate by the constitution-builders was whether the

deliberating body to succeed the Constituent Assembly should work in

conjunction with the King, whether it should be periodic or permanent,

whether it should govern by two chambers or by one.

The Abbe Maury, son of a cobbler, and therefore in these days of

antitheses orator-in-chief of the party of the Right--the Blacks, as

those who fought Privilege’s losing battles were known--was in the

tribune. He appeared to be urging the adoption of a two-chambers system

framed on the English model. He was, if anything, more long-winded and

prosy even than his habit; his arguments assumed more and more the form

of a sermon; the tribune of the National Assembly became more and

more like a pulpit; but the members, conversely, less and less like

a congregation. They grew restive under that steady flow of pompous

verbiage, and it was in vain that the four ushers in black satin

breeches and carefully powdered heads, chain of office on their breasts,

gilded sword at their sides, circulated in the Piste, clapping their

hands, and hissing,

“Silence! En place!”

Equally vain was the intermittent ringing of the bell by the president

at his green-covered table facing the tribune. The Abbe Maury had

talked too long, and for some time had failed to interest the members.

Realizing it at last, he ceased, whereupon the hum of conversation

became general. And then it fell abruptly. There was a silence of

expectancy, and a turning of heads, a craning of necks. Even the group

of secretaries at the round table below the president’s dais roused

themselves from their usual apathy to consider this young man who was

mounting the tribune of the Assembly for the first time.

“M. Andre-Louis Moreau, deputy suppleant, vice Emmanuel Lagron,

deceased, for Ancenis in the Department of the Loire.”

M. de La Tour d’Azyr shook himself out of the gloomy abstraction in

which he had sat. The successor of the deputy he had slain must, in

any event, be an object of grim interest to him. You conceive how that

interest was heightened when he heard him named, when, looking across,

he recognized indeed in this Andre-Louis Moreau the young scoundrel who

was continually crossing his path, continually exerting against him a

deep-moving, sinister influence to make him regret that he should have

spared his life that day at Gavrillac two years ago. That he should thus

have stepped into the shoes of Lagron seemed to M. de La Tour d’Azyr too

apt for mere coincidence, a direct challenge in itself.

He looked at the young man in wonder rather than in anger, and looking

at him he was filled by a vague, almost a premonitory, uneasiness.

At the very outset, the presence which in itself he conceived to be a

challenge was to demonstrate itself for this in no equivocal terms.

“I come before you,” Andre-Louis began, “as a deputy-suppleant to fill

the place of one who was murdered some three weeks ago.”

It was a challenging opening that instantly provoked an indignant outcry

from the Blacks. Andre-Louis paused, and looked at them, smiling a

little, a singularly self-confident young man.

“The gentlemen of the Right, M. le President, do not appear to like

my words. But that is not surprising. The gentlemen of the Right

notoriously do not like the truth.”

This time there was uproar. The members of the Left roared with

laughter, those of the Right thundered menacingly. The ushers circulated

at a pace beyond their usual, agitated themselves, clapped their hands,

and called in vain for silence.

The President rang his bell.

Above the general din came the voice of La Tour d’Azyr, who had

half-risen from his seat: “Mountebank! This is not the theatre!”

“No, monsieur, it is becoming a hunting-ground for bully-swordsmen,” was

the answer, and the uproar grew.

The deputy-suppleant looked round and waited. Near at hand he met the

encouraging grin of Le Chapelier, and the quiet, approving smile of

Kersain, another Breton deputy of his acquaintance. A little farther off

he saw the great head of Mirabeau thrown back, the great eyes regarding

him from under a frown in a sort of wonder, and yonder, among all

that moving sea of faces, the sallow countenance of the Arras’ lawyer

Robespierre--or de Robespierre, as the little snob now called himself,

having assumed the aristocratic particle as the prerogative of a man of

his distinction in the councils of his country. With his tip-tilted nose

in the air, his carefully curled head on one side, the deputy for Arras

was observing Andre-Louis attentively. The horn-rimmed spectacles he

used for reading were thrust up on to his pale forehead, and it was

through a levelled spy-glass that he considered the speaker, his

thin-lipped mouth stretched a little in that tiger-cat smile that was

afterwards to become so famous and so feared.

Gradually the uproar wore itself out, and diminished so that at last

the President could make himself heard. Leaning forward, he gravely

addressed the young man in the tribune:

“Monsieur, if you wish to be heard, let me beg of you not to be

provocative in your language.” And then to the others: “Messieurs, if

we are to proceed, I beg that you will restrain your feelings until the

deputy-suppleant has concluded his discourse.”

“I shall endeavour to obey, M. le President, leaving provocation to the

gentlemen of the Right. If the few words I have used so far have been

provocative, I regret it. But it was necessary that I should refer to

the distinguished deputy whose place I come so unworthily to fill, and

it was unavoidable that I should refer to the event which has procured

us this sad necessity. The deputy Lagron was a man of singular nobility

of mind, a selfless, dutiful, zealous man, inflamed by the high purpose

of doing his duty by his electors and by this Assembly. He possessed

what his opponents would call a dangerous gift of eloquence.”

La Tour d’Azyr writhed at the well-known phrase--his own phrase--the

phrase that he had used to explain his action in the matter of Philippe

de Vilmorin, the phrase that from time to time had been cast in his

teeth with such vindictive menace.

And then the crisp voice of the witty Canales, that very rapier of the

Privileged party, cut sharply into the speaker’s momentary pause.

“M. le President,” he asked with great solemnity, “has the

deputy-suppleant mounted the tribune for the purpose of taking part in

the debate on the constitution of the legislative assemblies, or for

the purpose of pronouncing a funeral oration upon the departed deputy

Lagron?”

This time it was the Blacks who gave way to mirth, until checked by the

deputy-suppleant.

“That laughter is obscene!” In this truly Gallic fashion he flung his

glove into the face of Privilege, determined, you see, upon no half

measures; and the rippling laughter perished on the instant quenched in

speechless fury.

Solemnly he proceeded.

“You all know how Lagron died. To refer to his death at all requires

courage, to laugh in referring to it requires something that I will not

attempt to qualify. If I have alluded to his decease, it is because my

own appearance among you seemed to render some such allusion necessary.

It is mine to take up the burden which he set down. I do not pretend

that I have the strength, the courage, or the wisdom of Lagron; but with

every ounce of such strength and courage and wisdom as I possess that

burden will I bear. And I trust, for the sake of those who might attempt

it, that the means taken to impose silence upon that eloquent voice will

not be taken to impose silence upon mine.”

There was a faint murmur of applause from the Left, splutter of

contemptuous laughter from the Right.

“Rhodomont!” a voice called to him.

He looked in the direction of that voice, proceeding from the group of

spadassins amid the Blacks across the Piste, and he smiled. Inaudibly

his lips answered:

“No, my friend--Scaramouche; Scaramouche, the subtle, dangerous fellow

who goes tortuously to his ends.” Aloud, he resumed: “M. le President,

there are those who will not understand that the purpose for which

we are assembled here is the making of laws by which France may be

equitably governed, by which France may be lifted out of the morass of

bankruptcy into which she is in danger of sinking. For there are some

who want, it seems, not laws, but blood; I solemnly warn them that this

blood will end by choking them, if they do not learn in time to discard

force and allow reason to prevail.”

Again in that phrase there was something that stirred a memory in

La Tour d’Azyr. He turned in the fresh uproar to speak to his cousin

Chabrillane who sat beside him.

“A daring rogue, this bastard of Gavrillac’s,” said he.

Chabrillane looked at him with gleaming eyes, his face white with anger.

“Let him talk himself out. I don’t think he will be heard again after

to-day. Leave this to me.”

Hardly could La Tour have told you why, but he sank back in his seat

with a sense of relief. He had been telling himself that here was matter

demanding action, a challenge that he must take up. But despite his rage

he felt a singular unwillingness. This fellow had a trick of reminding

him, he supposed, too unpleasantly of that young abbe done to death in

the garden behind the Breton arme at Gavrillac. Not that the death of

Philippe de Vilmorin lay heavily upon M. de La Tour d’Azyr’s conscience.

He had accounted himself fully justified of his action. It was that the

whole thing as his memory revived it for him made an unpleasant picture:

that distraught boy kneeling over the bleeding body of the friend he

had loved, and almost begging to be slain with him, dubbing the Marquis

murderer and coward to incite him.

Meanwhile, leaving now the subject of the death of Lagron, the

deputy-suppleant had at last brought himself into order, and was

speaking upon the question under debate. He contributed nothing of value

to it; he urged nothing definite. His speech on the subject was very

brief--that being the pretext and not the purpose for which he had

ascended the tribune.

When later he was leaving the hall at the end of the sitting, with Le

Chapelier at his side, he found himself densely surrounded by deputies

as by a body-guard. Most of them were Bretons, who aimed at screening

him from the provocations which his own provocative words in the

Assembly could not fail to bring down upon his head. For a moment the

massive form of Mirabeau brought up alongside of him.

“Felicitations, M. Moreau,” said the great man. “You acquitted yourself

very well. They will want your blood, no doubt. But be discreet,

monsieur, if I may presume to advise you, and do not allow yourself to

be misled by any false sense of quixotry. Ignore their challenges. I do

so myself. I place each challenger upon my list. There are some fifty

there already, and there they will remain. Refuse them what they are

pleased to call satisfaction, and all will be well.” Andre-Louis smiled

and sighed.

“It requires courage,” said the hypocrite.

“Of course it does. But you would appear to have plenty.”

“Hardly enough, perhaps. But I shall do my best.”

They had come through the vestibule, and although this was lined

with eager Blacks waiting for the young man who had insulted them so

flagrantly from the rostrum, Andre-Louis’ body-guard had prevented any

of them from reaching him.

Emerging now into the open, under the great awning at the head of the

Carriere, erected to enable carriages to reach the door under cover,

those in front of him dispersed a little, and there was a moment as he

reached the limit of the awning when his front was entirely uncovered.

Outside the rain was falling heavily, churning the ground into thick

mud, and for a moment Andre-Louis, with Le Chapelier ever at his side,

stood hesitating to step out into the deluge.

The watchful Chabrillane had seen his chance, and by a detour that

took him momentarily out into the rain, he came face to face with the

too-daring young Breton. Rudely, violently, he thrust Andre-Louis back,

as if to make room for himself under the shelter.

Not for a second was Andre-Louis under any delusion as to the man’s

deliberate purpose, nor were those who stood near him, who made a

belated and ineffectual attempt to close about him. He was grievously

disappointed. It was not Chabrillane he had been expecting. His

disappointment was reflected on his countenance, to be mistaken for

something very different by the arrogant Chevalier.

But if Chabrillane was the man appointed to deal with him, he would make

the best of it.

“I think you are pushing against me, monsieur,” he said, very civilly,

and with elbow and shoulder he thrust M. de Chabrillane back into the

rain.

“I desire to take shelter, monsieur,” the Chevalier hectored.

“You may do so without standing on my feet. I have a prejudice against

any one standing on my feet. My feet are very tender. Perhaps you did

not know it, monsieur. Please say no more.”

“Why, I wasn’t speaking, you lout!” exclaimed the Chevalier, slightly

discomposed.

“Were you not? I thought perhaps you were about to apologize.”

“Apologize?” Chabrillane laughed. “To you! Do you know that you are

amusing?” He stepped under the awning for the second time, and again in

view of all thrust Andre-Louis rudely back.

“Ah!” cried Andre-Louis, with a grimace. “You hurt me, monsieur. I have

told you not to push against me.” He raised his voice that all might

hear him, and once more impelled M. de Chabrillane back into the rain.

Now, for all his slenderness, his assiduous daily sword-practice had

given Andre-Louis an arm of iron. Also he threw his weight into the

thrust. His assailant reeled backwards a few steps, and then his

heel struck a baulk of timber left on the ground by some workmen that

morning, and he sat down suddenly in the mud.

A roar of laughter rose from all who witnessed the fine gentleman’s

downfall. He rose, mud-bespattered, in a fury, and in that fury sprang

at Andre-Louis.

Andre-Louis had made him ridiculous, which was altogether unforgivable.

“You shall meet me for this!” he spluttered. “I shall kill you for it.”

His inflamed face was within a foot of Andre-Louis’. Andre-Louis

laughed. In the silence everybody heard the laugh and the words that

followed.

“Oh, is that what you wanted? But why didn’t you say so before? You

would have spared me the trouble of knocking you down. I thought

gentlemen of your profession invariably conducted these affairs with

decency, decorum, and a certain grace. Had you done so, you might have

saved your breeches.”

“How soon shall we settle this?” snapped Chabrillane, livid with very

real fury.

“Whenever you please, monsieur. It is for you to say when it will

suit your convenience to kill me. I think that was the intention you

announced, was it not?” Andre-Louis was suavity itself.

“To-morrow morning, in the Bois. Perhaps you will bring a friend.”

“Certainly, monsieur. To-morrow morning, then. I hope we shall have fine

weather. I detest the rain.”

Chabrillane looked at him almost with amazement. Andre-Louis smiled

pleasantly.

“Don’t let me detain you now, monsieur. We quite understand each other.

I shall be in the Bois at nine o’clock to-morrow morning.”

“That is too late for me, monsieur.”

“Any other hour would be too early for me. I do not like to have my

habits disturbed. Nine o’clock or not at all, as you please.”

“But I must be at the Assembly at nine, for the morning session.”

“I am afraid, monsieur, you will have to kill me first, and I have a

prejudice against being killed before nine o’clock.”

Now this was too complete a subversion of the usual procedure for M.

de Chabrillane’s stomach. Here was a rustic deputy assuming with him

precisely the tone of sinister mockery which his class usually dealt out

to their victims of the Third Estate. And to heighten the irritation,

Andre-Louis--the actor, Scaramouche always--produced his snuffbox, and

proffered it with a steady hand to Le Chapelier before helping himself.

Chabrillane, it seemed, after all that he had suffered, was not even to

be allowed to make a good exit.

“Very well, monsieur,” he said. “Nine o’clock, then; and we’ll see if

you’ll talk as pertly afterwards.”

On that he flung away, before the jeers of the provincial deputies. Nor

did it soothe his rage to be laughed at by urchins all the way down the

Rue Dauphine because of the mud and filth that dripped from his satin

breeches and the tails of his elegant, striped coat.

But though the members of the Third had jeered on the surface, they

trembled underneath with fear and indignation. It was too much. Lagron

killed by one of these bullies, and now his successor challenged, and

about to be killed by another of them on the very first day of his

appearance to take the dead man’s place. Several came now to implore

Andre-Louis not to go to the Bois, to ignore the challenge and the whole

affair, which was but a deliberate attempt to put him out of the way.

He listened seriously, shook his head gloomily, and promised at last to

think it over.

He was in his seat again for the afternoon session as if nothing

disturbed him.

But in the morning, when the Assembly met, his place was vacant, and so

was M. de Chabrillane’s. Gloom and resentment sat upon the members

of the Third, and brought a more than usually acrid note into their

debates. They disapproved of the rashness of the new recruit to their

body. Some openly condemned his lack of circumspection. Very few--and

those only the little group in Le Chapelier’s confidence--ever expected

to see him again.

It was, therefore, as much in amazement as in relief that at a few

minutes after ten they saw him enter, calm, composed, and bland, and

thread his way to his seat. The speaker occupying the rostrum at that

moment--a member of the Privileged--stopped short to stare in incredulous

dismay. Here was something that he could not understand at all. Then

from somewhere, to satisfy the amazement on both sides of the assembly,

a voice explained the phenomenon contemptuously.

“They haven’t met. He has shirked it at the last moment.”

It must be so, thought all; the mystification ceased, and men were

settling back into their seats. But now, having reached his place,

having heard the voice that explained the matter to the universal

satisfaction, Andre-Louis paused before taking his seat. He felt it

incumbent upon him to reveal the true fact.

“M. le President, my excuses for my late arrival.” There was no

necessity for this. It was a mere piece of theatricality, such as it

was not in Scaramouche’s nature to forgo. “I have been detained by an

engagement of a pressing nature. I bring you also the excuses of M. de

Chabrillane. He, unfortunately, will be permanently absent from this

Assembly in future.”

The silence was complete. Andre-Louis sat down.