Scaramouche: A Romance of the French Revolution

by Rafael Sabatini

  CHAPTER III. PRESIDENT LE CHAPELIER

  The ferment of Paris which, during the two following days, resembled anarmed camp rather than a city, delayed the burial of Bertrand des Amisuntil the Wednesday of that eventful week. Amid events that were shakinga nation to its foundations the death of a fencing-master passed almostunnoticed even among his pupils, most of whom did not come to theacademy during the two days that his body lay there. Some few, however,did come, and these conveyed the news to others, with the result thatthe master was followed to Pere Lachaise by a score of young men at thehead of whom as chief mourner walked Andre-Louis.

  There were no relatives to be advised so far as Andre-Louis was aware,although within a week of M. des Amis' death a sister turned up fromPassy to claim his heritage. This was considerable, for the master hadprospered and saved money, most of which was invested in the Compagniedes Eaux and the National Debt. Andre-Louis consigned her to thelawyers, and saw her no more.

  The death of des Amis left him with so profound a sense of lonelinessand desolation that he had no thought or care for the sudden accessof fortune which it automatically procured him. To the master's sistermight fall such wealth as he had amassed, but Andre-Louis succeededto the mine itself from which that wealth had been extracted, thefencing-school in which by now he was himself so well established as aninstructor that its numerous pupils looked to him to carry it forwardsuccessfully as its chief. And never was there a season in whichfencing-academies knew such prosperity as in these troubled days, whenevery man was sharpening his sword and schooling himself in the uses ofit.

  It was not until a couple of weeks later that Andre-Louis realized whathad really happened to him, and he found himself at the same time anexhausted man, for during that fortnight he had been doing the work oftwo. If he had not hit upon the happy expedient of pairing-off hismore advanced pupils to fence with each other, himself standing by tocriticize, correct and otherwise instruct, he must have found the taskutterly beyond his strength. Even so, it was necessary for him to fencesome six hours daily, and every day he brought arrears of lassitudefrom yesterday until he was in danger of succumbing under the increasingburden of fatigue. In the end he took an assistant to deal withbeginners, who gave the hardest work. He found him readily enoughby good fortune in one of his own pupils named Le Duc. As the summeradvanced, and the concourse of pupils steadily increased, it becamenecessary for him to take yet another assistant--an able young instructornamed Galoche--and another room on the floor above.

  They were strenuous days for Andre-Louis, more strenuous than he hadever known, even when he had been at work to build up the Binet Company;but it follows that they were days of extraordinary prosperity. Hecomments regretfully upon the fact that Bertrand des Amis shouldhave died by ill-chance on the very eve of so profitable a vogue ofsword-play.

  The arms of the Academie du Roi, to which Andre-Louis had no title,still continued to be displayed outside his door. He had overcome thedifficulty in a manner worthy of Scaramouche. He left the escutcheon andthe legend "Academie de Bertrand des Amis, Maitre en fait d'Armes desAcademies du Roi," appending to it the further legend: "Conducted byAndre-Louis."

  With little time now in which to go abroad it was from his pupilsand the newspapers--of which a flood had risen in Paris with theestablishment of the freedom of the Press--that he learnt of therevolutionary processes around him, following upon, as a measure ofanticlimax, the fall of the Bastille. That had happened whilst M. desAmis lay dead, on the day before they buried him, and was indeed thechief reason of the delay in his burial. It was an event that had itsinspiration in that ill-considered charge of Prince Lambesc in which thefencing-master had been killed.

  The outraged people had besieged the electors in the Hotel de Ville,demanding arms with which to defend their lives from these foreignmurderers hired by despotism. And in the end the electors had consentedto give them arms, or, rather--for arms it had none to give--to permitthem to arm themselves. Also it had given them a cockade, of red andblue, the colours of Paris. Because these colours were also those of theliveries of the Duke of Orleans, white was added to them--the white ofthe ancient standard of France--and thus was the tricolour born. Further,a permanent committee of electors was appointed to watch over publicorder.

  Thus empowered the people went to work with such good effect that withinthirty-six hours sixty thousand pikes had been forged. At nine o'clockon Tuesday morning thirty thousand men were before the Invalides. Byeleven o'clock they had ravished it of its store of arms amounting tosome thirty thousand muskets, whilst others had seized the Arsenal andpossessed themselves of powder.

  Thus they prepared to resist the attack that from seven points was tobe launched that evening upon the city. But Paris did not wait for theattack. It took the initiative. Mad with enthusiasm it conceived theinsane project of taking that terrible menacing fortress, the Bastille,and, what is more, it succeeded, as you know, before five o'clock thatnight, aided in the enterprise by the French Guards with cannon.

  The news of it, borne to Versailles by Lambesc in flight with hisdragoons before the vast armed force that had sprouted from thepaving-stones of Paris, gave the Court pause. The people were inpossession of the guns captured from the Bastille. They were erectingbarricades in the streets, and mounting these guns upon them. The attackhad been too long delayed. It must be abandoned since now it could leadonly to fruitless slaughter that must further shake the already sorelyshaken prestige of Royalty.

  And so the Court, growing momentarily wise again under the spur of fear,preferred to temporize. Necker should be brought back yet once again,the three orders should sit united as the National Assembly demanded. Itwas the completest surrender of force to force, the only argument. TheKing went alone to inform the National Assembly of that eleventh-hourresolve, to the great comfort of its members, who viewed with pain andalarm the dreadful state of things in Paris. "No force but the force ofreason and argument" was their watchword, and it was so to continue fortwo years yet, with a patience and fortitude in the face of ceaselessprovocation to which insufficient justice has been done.

  As the King was leaving the Assembly, a woman, embracing his knees, gavetongue to what might well be the question of all France:

  "Ah, sire, are you really sincere? Are you sure they will not make youchange your mind?"

  Yet no such question was asked when a couple of days later the King,alone and unguarded save by the representatives of the Nation, came toParis to complete the peacemaking, the surrender of Privilege. The Courtwas filled with terror by the adventure. Were they not the "enemy,"these mutinous Parisians? And should a King go thus among his enemies?If he shared some of that fear, as the gloom of him might lead us tosuppose, he must have found it idle. What if two hundred thousand menunder arms--men without uniforms and with the most extraordinary motleyof weapons ever seen--awaited him? They awaited him as a guard of honour.

  Mayor Bailly at the barrier presented him with the keys of the city."These are the same keys that were presented to Henri IV. He hadreconquered his people. Now the people have reconquered their King."

  At the Hotel de Ville Mayor Bailly offered him the new cockade, thetricoloured symbol of constitutional France, and when he had given hisroyal confirmation to the formation of the Garde Bourgeoise and to theappointments of Bailly and Lafayette, he departed again for Versaillesamid the shouts of "Vive le Roi!" from his loyal people.

  And now you see Privilege--before the cannon's mouth, as itwere--submitting at last, where had they submitted sooner they might havesaved oceans of blood--chiefly their own. They come, nobles and clergy,to join the National Assembly, to labour with it upon this constitutionthat is to regenerate France. But the reunion is a mockery--as much amockery as that of the Archbishop of Paris singing the Te Deum forthe fall of the Bastille--most grotesque and incredible of all thesegrotesque and incredible events. All that has happened to the NationalAssembly is that it has introduced five or six hundred enemies to hamperand hinder its delibera
tions.

  But all this is an oft-told tale, to be read in detail elsewhere. Igive you here just so much of it as I have found in Andre-Louis' ownwritings, almost in his own words, reflecting the changes that wereoperated in his mind. Silent now, he came fully to believe in thosethings in which he had not believed when earlier he had preached them.

  Meanwhile together with the change in his fortune had come a changein his position towards the law, a change brought about by the otherchanges wrought around him. No longer need he hide himself. Who in thesedays would prefer against him the grotesque charge of sedition forwhat he had done in Brittany? What court would dare to send him to thegallows for having said in advance what all France was saying now? Asfor that other possible charge of murder, who should concern himselfwith the death of the miserable Binet killed by him--if, indeed, he hadkilled him, as he hoped--in self-defence.

  And so one fine day in early August, Andre-Louis gave himself a holidayfrom the academy, which was now working smoothly under his assistants,hired a chaise and drove out to Versailles to the Cafe d'Amaury, whichhe knew for the meeting-place of the Club Breton, the seed from whichwas to spring that Society of the Friends of the Constitution betterknown as the Jacobins. He went to seek Le Chapelier, who had been oneof the founders of the club, a man of great prominence now, president ofthe Assembly in this important season when it was deliberating upon theDeclaration of the Rights of Man.

  Le Chapelier's importance was reflected in the sudden servility of theshirt-sleeved, white-aproned waiter of whom Andre-Louis inquired for therepresentative.

  M. Le Chapelier was above-stairs with friends. The waiter desired toserve the gentleman, but hesitated to break in upon the assembly inwhich M. le Depute found himself.

  Andre-Louis gave him a piece of silver to encourage him to make theattempt. Then he sat down at a marble-topped table by the window lookingout over the wide tree-encircled square. There, in that common-room ofthe cafe, deserted at this hour of mid-afternoon, the great man came tohim. Less than a year ago he had yielded precedence to Andre-Louis ina matter of delicate leadership; to-day he stood on the heights, oneof the great leaders of the Nation in travail, and Andre-Louis was deepdown in the shadows of the general mass.

  The thought was in the minds of both as they scanned each other, eachnoting in the other the marked change that a few months had wrought.In Le Chapelier, Andre-Louis observed certain heightened refinements ofdress that went with certain subtler refinements of countenance. He wasthinner than of old, his face was pale and there was a weariness in theeyes that considered his visitor through a gold-rimmed spy-glass. InAndre-Louis those jaded but quick-moving eyes of the Breton deputy notedchanges even more marked. The almost constant swordmanship of theselast months had given Andre-Louis a grace of movement, a poise, and acurious, indefinable air of dignity, of command. He seemed taller byvirtue of this, and he was dressed with an elegance which if quiet wasnone the less rich. He wore a small silver-hilted sword, and wore it asif used to it, and his black hair that Le Chapelier had never seen otherthan fluttering lank about his bony cheeks was glossy now and gatheredinto a club. Almost he had the air of a petit-maitre.

  In both, however, the changes were purely superficial, as each wassoon to reveal to the other. Le Chapelier was ever the same direct anddownright Breton, abrupt of manner and of speech. He stood smiling amoment in mingled surprise and pleasure; then opened wide his arms. Theyembraced under the awe-stricken gaze of the waiter, who at once effacedhimself.

  "Andre-Louis, my friend! Whence do you drop?"

  "We drop from above. I come from below to survey at close quarters onewho is on the heights."

  "On the heights! But that you willed it so, it is yourself might now bestanding in my place."

  "I have a poor head for heights, and I find the atmosphere too rarefied.Indeed, you look none too well on it yourself, Isaac. You are pale."

  "The Assembly was in session all last night. That is all. These damnedPrivileged multiply our difficulties. They will do so until we decreetheir abolition."

  They sat down. "Abolition! You contemplate so much? Not that yousurprise me. You have always been an extremist."

  "I contemplate it that I may save them. I seek to abolish themofficially, so as to save them from abolition of another kind at thehands of a people they exasperate."

  "I see. And the King?"

  "The King is the incarnation of the Nation. We shall deliver himtogether with the Nation from the bondage of Privilege. Our constitutionwill accomplish it. You agree?"

  Andre-Louis shrugged. "Does it matter? I am a dreamer in politics, nota man of action. Until lately I have been very moderate; more moderatethan you think. But now almost I am a republican. I have been watching,and I have perceived that this King is--just nothing, a puppet who dancesaccording to the hand that pulls the string."

  "This King, you say? What other king is possible? You are surely notof those who weave dreams about Orleans? He has a sort of party, afollowing largely recruited by the popular hatred of the Queen and theknown fact that she hates him. There are some who have thought of makinghim regent, some even more; Robespierre is of the number."

  "Who?" asked Andre-Louis, to whom the name was unknown.

  "Robespierre--a preposterous little lawyer who represents Arras, ashabby, clumsy, timid dullard, who will make speeches through his noseto which nobody listens--an ultra-royalist whom the royalists and theOrleanists are using for their own ends. He has pertinacity, and heinsists upon being heard. He may be listened to some day. But thathe, or the others, will ever make anything of Orleans... pish! Orleanshimself may desire it, but the man is a eunuch in crime; he would, buthe can't. The phrase is Mirabeau's."

  He broke off to demand Andre-Louis' news of himself.

  "You did not treat me as a friend when you wrote to me," he complained."You gave me no clue to your whereabouts; you represented yourself as onthe verge of destitution and withheld from me the means to come to yourassistance. I have been troubled in mind about you, Andre. Yet to judgeby your appearance I might have spared myself that. You seem prosperous,assured. Tell me of it."

  Andre-Louis told him frankly all that there was to tell. "Do you knowthat you are an amazement to me?" said the deputy. "From the robe to thebuskin, and now from the buskin to the sword! What will be the end ofyou, I wonder?"

  "The gallows, probably."

  "Pish! Be serious. Why not the toga of the senator in senatorial France?It might be yours now if you had willed it so."

  "The surest way to the gallows of all," laughed Andre-Louis.

  At the moment Le Chapelier manifested impatience. I wonder did thephrase cross his mind that day four years later when himself he rode inthe death-cart to the Greve.

  "We are sixty-six Breton deputies in the Assembly. Should a vacancyoccur, will you act as suppleant? A word from me together with theinfluence of your name in Rennes and Nantes, and the thing is done."

  Andre-Louis laughed outright. "Do you know, Isaac, that I never meet youbut you seek to thrust me into politics?"

  "Because you have a gift for politics. You were born for politics."

  "Ah, yes--Scaramouche in real life. I've played it on the stage. Let thatsuffice. Tell me, Isaac, what news of my old friend, La Tour d'Azyr?"

  "He is here in Versailles, damn him--a thorn in the flesh of theAssembly. They've burnt his chateau at La Tour d'Azyr. Unfortunately hewasn't in it at the time. The flames haven't even singed his insolence.He dreams that when this philosophic aberration is at an end, there willbe serfs to rebuild it for him."

  "So there has been trouble in Brittany?" Andre-Louis had become suddenlygrave, his thoughts swinging to Gavrillac.

  "An abundance of it, and elsewhere too. Can you wonder? These delaysat such a time, with famine in the land? Chateaux have been going up insmoke during the last fortnight. The peasants took their cue fromthe Parisians, and treated every castle as a Bastille. Order is beingrestored, there as here, and they are quieter now."

/>   "What of Gavrillac? Do you know?"

  "I believe all to be well. M. de Kercadiou was not a Marquis de La Tourd'Azyr. He was in sympathy with his people. It is not likely that theywould injure Gavrillac. But don't you correspond with your godfather?"

  "In the circumstances--no. What you tell me would make it now moredifficult than ever, for he must account me one of those who helped tolight the torch that has set fire to so much belonging to his class.Ascertain for me that all is well, and let me know."

  "I will, at once."

  At parting, when Andre-Louis was on the point of stepping into hiscabriolet to return to Paris, he sought information on another matter.

  "Do you happen to know if M. de La Tour d'Azyr has married?" he asked.

  "I don't; which really means that he hasn't. One would have heard of itin the case of that exalted Privileged."

  "To be sure." Andre-Louis spoke indifferently. "Au revoir, Isaac! You'llcome and see me--13 Rue du Hasard. Come soon."

  "As soon and as often as my duties will allow. They keep me chained hereat present."

  "Poor slave of duty with your gospel of liberty!"

  "True! And because of that I will come. I have a duty to Brittany: tomake Omnes Omnibus one of her representatives in the National Assembly."

  "That is a duty you will oblige me by neglecting," laughed Andre-Louis,and drove away.