City of Darkness, City of Light

by Marge Piercy

  They heard that the Convention had greeted the news of their arrest with disbelief, demanding the two committees appear and justify their action. Robespierre and Saint-Just came. Robespierre spoke first and tamed the Convention. Then Saint-Just delivered the accusation. When he finished, only one man rose to defend them. Robespierre silenced him with a threat: “Anyone who defends them is obviously of the same faction and should be dealt with in the same fashion.” There were yells from the back and muttering, but no one dared stand up. Now even the delegates were afraid.

  Yet he was not as helpless as they thought. He was in possession of his finest weapon, his voice, his rhetoric, his ability to move crowds. He would take over the fake trial, the quick march toward death, and he would turn it into a play called The Vindication of Danton before the People of Paris.

  The next day, they were taken to court in closed carriages. Georges was in the same carriage with Camille, Hérault and the brothers Frei, two Austrian-born financiers who had been involved in the East India scandal. “We’re being tried because we’re foreigners. You’re being tried because you’re a true Frenchman,” Emmanuel Frei said. They could peek out of the carriage. There were enormous crowds gathered already, a line that ran for blocks. Not a tenth of these people could hope to get in. So much the better. He could make himself heard outside the room. It was a gorgeous spring day, pale blue, a good breeze carrying away the city odors.

  When the prosecutor, Fouquier-Tinville, called on Camille to identify himself, he said, “Camille Desmoulins, thirty-three, the age at which that sansculotte Jesus died. But then, cousin, you know me well. I got you this job. At this moment, I regret my nepotism.”

  Georges boomed out, “Georges-Jacques Danton, thirty-four years of age, address, soon to be nowhere, but I will live in history.”

  When the accusations were read out, Georges roared again, “I demand my accusers face me. I demand my right to address the Convention that has libeled me without evidence, without hearing my defense. I demand to address the Convention, or have my accusers brought here.” He read out the list of sixteen names of those he considered his persecutors. “Face to face. No hiding behind the Tribunal. Let’s have this out in the open.”

  Most of the day was spent laying out the case against the East India conspirators. It was pretty damning, but there was little but friendship to link Camille and Georges to that mess. In the course of the day Westerman, one of the few competent generals but too close to them, was added to the indictment, although he’d been called as a witness.

  Westerman cried out, “I demand to know the accusation. I demand that the accusation against me be spelled out.”

  “It’s only a formality,” the judge said.

  “This trial is only a formality,” Georges said loudly. “Look, they laugh. Even the judge laughs. Write that down.”

  He demanded that Robespierre be called as a witness and Lindet from the great Committee. Lindet was honest. If Lindet were questioned, he would expose the division in the Committee. Georges still had a hand to play.

  Hérault was talkative as they were taken to cells in the same building. “You weren’t in Paris when the duc d’Orléans died. He was elegant to the end, lacking in brains but a great sense of style. He might well’ve made a better king than Louis. He was certainly better dressed for his last bow. Green coat, white vest, and gorgeous yellow leather boots. Sanson wanted the boots and tried to take them off. ‘Patience,’ Égalité said. ‘They’ll come off more easily when there’s less of me.’”

  “An example to us all,” Camille said sourly. “I plan to go kicking and screaming and calling for my mother.”

  “Like Hébert? No, Camille, we must act the part. It’s a little stage, the guillotine, and history notes down the lines and the performance,” Georges said. “But we may yet turn this around. So far we have them cowed.”

  They spent the night in cells below the court room. The next day the clerk read out Saint-Just’s long indictment. Georges could feel the jury and the crowd turn against him. Well, Saint-Just wasn’t here and he was. He simply took over and spoke. Just as he could charm a woman to bed, he could mesmerize men. He was the lead bull and the herd fell in. He was the lion who dominated the pride. When he roared, Fouquier and the judge lay down and behaved. His voice carried out of the courtroom through the open windows to the crowd. He wished he could roar loud enough for all of Paris to hear him. They would be in the streets to save him. He watched the thirteen jurors. A couple of them resisted him, hard as stone pigs, but most of them were with him. He was carrying them on the tempest of his voice. They were nodding. The day was uncommonly warm for early April and he sweated hard. He kept wiping his brow with a linen handkerchief Louise embroidered with his initials. He had to win, because he had not begun to have enough of her yet. He had a sense of doing exactly what he was made to do, acting from the center of his body. “You are the people and it is you who will judge me. It is all France who should hear my case.”

  Notes passed between judge and prosecutor. They were scared. It was late afternoon and his voice was beginning to tire. He let them adjourn. Tomorrow he would resume his case. He had his audience.

  The next morning Fouquier said, “I shall now read out the Convention’s answer to the demands of the accused. The trial will proceed here, not in the Convention. Any defendant who offends the court will be removed at once. No theatrics and no disturbances and no long speeches will be tolerated.”

  The room fell completely silent. Danton felt as if he had been shot. He rose, ignoring the judge’s admonitions. “The decree you have read is nothing but a fiendish device to kill us. I never insulted the court. We raised no revolt. You want to condemn us without hearing us. I refuse. I am Danton still and I shall sleep in glory!” Two bailiffs seized him and a third pushed him from behind. They were all promptly hustled downstairs.

  The trial droned on in their absence. Finally a friendly guard came to tell them that the jury had retired. Hours passed. The jury did not reappear. They were brought dinner, and still the jury was deliberating. Had he managed to sway them? He began to hope again. He could see sunlight falling on the stones of the courtyard through a window, and never had sunlight looked so brilliant and vivid. Then the prisoners passed it along that Amar and Vadier from Security had gone into the room where the jurors were arguing. Five minutes later they came out, followed by the jurors. The jury announced it had found them all guilty.

  They were gathered, the fifteen whose cases had been joined, in the outer office of the Conciergerie. They could look out and see three tumbrels awaiting them and Sanson and his assistants making ready. “If I could leave my legs to Couthon and my balls to Robespierre, then the Revolution might hobble on,” Georges said to Hérault. Camille had just heard that Lucile had been arrested in a ludicrous plot to free them. That finished him. He was weeping.

  One by one they sat on the old stool. The executioner’s assistant tore their shirts open at the throat, bound their hands behind them and cut their hair above the nape. One by one they stood and waited. Chabot fell on the floor writhing and moaning. He had taken arsenic but not enough. Still, as the tumbrels jolted over the paving stones, he passed out. Camille was crying about Lucile and Horace. Hérault braced himself next to Georges, urging Camille to behave himself with dignity. The crowds were greater than in recent weeks. Executions had become humdrum, but theirs was an event.

  “Who would have thought two years ago we’d all do each other in,” Georges mused to Hérault. “It’s a disease. The poison of power.”

  “Robespierre was noble in the opposition; in authority, vicious.”

  “We all got spattered with blood. We were in a crazy hurry.”

  The statue of Liberty faced the guillotine before them. Now he saw the guillotine itself. The drums beat. The executioner’s assistants did a little dance. As they approached the steps, Hérault, first on the list Fouquier had drawn up, turned to kiss Georges. Sanson stopped him. “None of that.�
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  “Don’t be a fool.” Georges grinned. “Our heads will kiss in the basket soon enough.”

  Camille struggled all the way to the guillotine. It was not cowardice like Hébert, but he refused to acquiesce. He would not go quietly. He would protest as long as he could.

  Georges was last. As he was strapped down, he said to Sanson, “Show my head to the crowd. It’s worth a look.”

  He could not think of anything to regret, except perhaps that he had not figured out a way to outfox Robespierre. Oh, he had another regret: that he had set up that damned Tribunal. It had seemed, like so many things, a good idea at the time. Maybe they should just have let the sections run wild and then settle down. The squabble for power had proved more compelling and destructive than any of them had guessed. But Robespierre would follow him soon enough, and then it would all be over. He smiled.

  SEVENTY-EIGHT

  Nicolas

  (March-April 1794)

  NICOLAS expected the pressure would diminish, insanity would cease and those labeled Girondins would slowly return to their normal lives, out of power but out of danger also. They were all supporters of the Revolution, of the Republic. Their crimes were political. Such errors should be punished by a loss of office, a loss of control of the executive or the legislative branch. It was barbarous to defeat a faction, then put them to death.

  Sophie could not come to him as often. She was watched. She had to begin divorce proceedings against him or lose their remaining property, which would be confiscated. She assured him the divorce was only a formality, but he suffered. The hard part was not to see his daughter, and especially not to see his wife except every three weeks or so. And to know she was no longer his wife. Every time he thought of the divorce, he felt as if he had been struck in the chest.

  Finally Sophie was able to come. “Everyone is full of hope that the execution of Hébert and his cohorts means the Terror is over. They were pushing for more executions, and they seem to have gotten what they wanted. Everyone is whispering that Robespierre means to ease things now. Soon you may be able to come home.”

  “I never trusted that man. A narrow mind and great intensity. Sophie, I have something to give you today.”

  “You finished your book!” She embraced him.

  “I believe I’m done, but you’ll tell me if I’m right.”

  It was two and a half weeks before she could return, on a Sunday. “It’s a true Sunday, a day of sunshine, when I see you,” he said awkwardly. He was shyer with her, knowing she was no longer his wife.

  She laughed. “Nobody calls it Sunday any longer, Nico. It’s Seventh Day of the ten-day decade. You see people counting on their fingers. Now listen to me, this is your masterpiece. We have to get it published.”

  “There’s no hurry. … Sophie, is it true that Danton and Desmoulins have been arrested?”

  She nodded. “The Terror isn’t over. It’s stepping up. They just took Lucile Desmoulins and Hébert’s wife, the ex-nun. They will all die. It’s predetermined.”

  He took her face between his hands. It disturbed him to see signs of wear, of stress. She worked tremendously hard to support their child, him, her own sister. “Sophie, I won’t survive this. Few of us who made the Revolution will. The people were not educated enough. But it will work itself out. We’ll have republican institutions and an educated populace able to vote change, instead of picking up pikes and pistols and rioting—”

  “The Terror can’t last forever. Just sit tight. Stay hidden.”

  “What matters is that you must marry again. I want no widow’s weeds, no black crepe. I lived a full and good life. I enjoyed my work, I effected some change, I loved and was loved. I had amazing friends, Voltaire, Tom Paine, Bonneville, Franklin, Turgot, d’Alembert. When I’m gone, you must make a new life full of joy and companionship.”

  “Nico, forgive me if I decline. I can’t do it—No, don’t shake your head at me. I’m not sentimental. But I’ve had an equal relationship with my husband. I’ve been treated with respect. We shared our minds, our bodies, our child. I can’t marry someone who won’t treat me as an equal. I don’t believe the man is born who can do that, except you. You are unique. I’ve had you, and I won’t settle for less. I want friends, I’d like to be more comfortable, I want a good education for Eliza. But I do not want an inferior marriage.”

  “I hope life surprises you, Sophie.” He felt they were saying goodbye as they embraced, holding each other fiercely.

  When she had left, he spoke to his landlady. “Mme Vernet, my presence endangers you. Those who shelter fugitives are going to the guillotine. I can’t permit that to happen to you. What would become of your niece and your cat?”

  “Sir, you may be outlawed by the government, but they can’t outlaw you from my house. I know you’re a good man. You stay right here.” She set her niece to keep watch on him when she couldn’t.

  He waited for a slip in their surveillance. He had told Sophie to keep his manuscript safe. She said she would have it copied. He knew she meant she would do so herself—at night when she should be sleeping. He cut off his hair with a nail scissors, trying to look different. Danton’s trial was going on as broad farce. He had always like Danton, a man willing to compromise and find the pragmatic way through. A good man on committees and in assemblies. Probably in a functioning republic, there would be many such politicians. People might scorn politicians and their willingness to negotiate and shift positions, but they were preferable to fanatics. People were more real to them than ideas. Desmoulins was different, brilliant but disturbed. They would be missed. The lion fell, the gazelle went down, and the lesser beasts remained, the rats, the ferrets, the nippers and biters who required a crowd to bring down their prey. He was being melodramatic. The Republic would continue when all of them were dead. He had finished his life’s work with his Progress. He must not bring anyone down with him. So many of the Girondins were gone, to the guillotine or dead by their own hand: Roland had killed himself when the word came to him that Manon had been guillotined. Buzot had done the same.

  One morning, a tablecloth hanging by the fire was set ablaze by a spark. Madame dunked it in a bucket immediately. The women were preoccupied fanning out the smoke. He took the small valise he had packed, put on a ragged red wool cap and rough jacket Cabanis had brought and walked out. The papers of the day proclaimed the death of Danton. He headed straight out of Paris.

  He knew where the Suards had a house, the couple with whom he lived until he moved into the Mint. He had loved Amélie for years, platonically. They had disapproved of his marriage and his political career. But what did that matter? He needed them, and if they wanted to say that he had received his due, then he would bow his head and listen to reproaches. He reached them by nightfall and rapped on their door. “Antoine, it’s me. I’ve been in hiding, but I had to leave.”

  Antoine was not pleased to see him. They gave him supper but made it clear they did not want him under their roof for the night. Amélie put bread and sausage in his pocket. Antoine lent him a Horace to read on the journey. They thrust him out the door. How afraid people were. Here was a fellow academician, and he would not even risk for one night what Mme Vernet, who had known nothing about him, had been willing to risk for nine months. His feet were sore. He had never been a great walker, and for months, he had scarcely left his room. His feet swelled. Blisters puffed and cracked open. He stumbled into an area of stone quarries, dangerous in the dark. He lay down shivering in a field and tried to sleep. It was bitter cold. The ground was wet with dew. He slept scarcely at all but rose at dawn, stiff, chilled, his nose running and with a bad cough.

  He walked on, soon thoroughly lost. He should have a map: where would he get one? He had the vague idea of heading for Switzerland, but he could not tell in what direction he was walking. It was a cloudy day. It seemed the sun was rising that way, which must be east. Then he must head that way. Soon he was back in the quarries again. He used up the little food the Suards had
given him and spent the night in a shed.

  A dog set upon him the next morning and ripped his leg open before he could fend the beast off with a stick. He staggered on. By now his clothes were torn and he could not walk farther on his raw and bloody feet. His boots were considered fine leather, but they were not made for walking all day. The soles were beginning to separate. Toward seven he came to an inn. He staggered inside. Fortunately, he had money.

  “An omelette,” he ordered. Food. That was what he needed more than anything. He had not had anything to eat in twenty-four hours. He had been drinking rainwater from puddles.

  A couple of men came to stand over him. “Who are you?”

  He had identification papers in the name of Pierre Simone, a carpenter. One of them took his right hand. “Soft. A gentleman’s hand. You’re no carpenter.”

  “How many eggs do you want in that omelette?” the innkeeper’s wife called.

  He had no idea. He had, of course, never made an omelette. He had never been in a kitchen in his life. But he was immensely hungry. “A dozen.”

  The room fell silent. Now all the men were rising and moving toward his table. The man who had seized his hand before now pulled him up out of his seat. “Nobody, nobody ever has an omelette with a dozen eggs. You’re one of those fucking aristocrats, aren’t you? You’re one of them stealing our food and keeping us down and bringing in the enemy soldiers. Martin, let’s take him to jail. The tribunal can deal with him in the morning.”

  “Look, he has a book in his pocket. In some foreign language. Who knows what it says? He could be a spy.”