The Devil’s Laughter

by Frank Yerby

  Jean rushed forward, his hand outstretched to greet M. Renoir Gerade, late Intendant of the King for Provence.

  M. Gerade saw him coming and frowned warningly. Jean slowed his pace, his eyes a little puzzled.

  Renoir Genade put out his hand.

  “Box soir, M’sieur,” he said calmly, but rather too loudly, Jean thought; then: “Whom have I the honour of addressing?”

  Jean took a step backward, pure astonishment in his eyes. But M. Gerade kept his grip on Jean’s hand tight, and even pulled him forward a little. Then, scarcely moving his lips at all, in the trained flat monotone of the expert conspirator which was ever so much more effective than a whisper, he said: “I haven’t forgotten you, my learned footpad! But, by God’s love, don’t recognise me! You’ll ruin everything. . . .”

  Jean nodded.

  “I am the Citizen Deputy Jean Paul Marin, from the district of Saint Jule. And you, Citizen?”

  “Just plain Renoir Gerade,” the tall man smiled. “Enchanted, Citizen Marin. . . . Ah, our good host!”

  Mirabeau shook hands warmly with the newcomer. Then leaning forward, he whispered:

  “The petit salon, Gerade, my friend. But not just now. Wander about a bit. Have wine. Then quietly disappear. You, Marin, can go there now, I will join you two as soon as I can. . . .”

  Jean had to wait only a few minutes before Gerade appeared. This time his smile was open and frank, his brown eyes twinkling.

  “Well, mon vieux,” he said, “it has been a long time, eh?”

  “Yes,” Jean smiled; “too long. I have waited years for the chance to thank you, M. Gerade.”

  “Renoir, to you,” Genade said. “Sorry it didn’t work. I heard the story. So the noble wench betrayed you, eh?”

  “No!” Jean said. “You have not heard the truth, M. Gerade. . . .”

  “And the truth is?” Renoir Gerade smiled.

  Jean reddened to the roots of his hair.

  “She—she merely delayed me a bit,” he said; “nothing was further from her intent than . . .”

  “Forget it, my old one!” Gerade laughed; “I made a pleasantry—and, I confess, indulged my curiosity a bit. ‘Tis a failing of the old.”

  I, Jean thought suddenly, have never seen anyone who retained his youth like this one. He must be nearing sixty, and except for that white hair . . .

  The door crashed open.

  “Now to business!” the Comte de Mirabeau roared. “But first, a few questions, M. Marin. Gerade’s ideas I know; yours, but imperfectly. In that madhouse of an Assembly, who can gain a clear picture of what anybody thinks?”

  “As you will, Citizen Riquetti,” Jean mocked.

  “Damn your eyes!” Minabeau bellowed; “you must have your joke, eh, Marin?”

  “Forgive me,” Jean smiled; “what is it you want to know?”

  “You want to retain the King—why?”

  “Not the King,” Jean corrected; “the office of kingship. I would gladly rid France of this bumbling incompetent who encumbers the throne at the moment, if I could do it without destroying the crown. Since we can’t, we must suffer him.”

  “Good, but still—why the kingship?”

  “Because of what I’ve seen of the people in action, I don’t think they’re ready for a Republic. I begin to wonder now if people can ever be made ready to really govern themselves. Hence, a King—even a fairly strong King, but hedged about with such limitations as would eliminate any possibility of tyranny. A constitutional monarchy, M. Mirabeau.”

  “Sound, eh, Gerade?” Mirabeau rumbled.

  “Quite,” Renoir Gerade said.

  “Wait,” Jean said; “you’d better hear me out; because I disagree with you on one point that may make me useless to you. I am completely, unalterably, opposed to a hereditary nobility.”

  “Why?” Mirabeau said.

  “Because they corrupt men—as anything unearned always does. Titles and honours—fine; the King should have the power to give them for noteworthy services to the nation. But why should the idiotic son of a wise and just Comte be also a Comte, M. Mirabeau? If my son grows up intelligent and strong, it should be as easy for him to earn his patents of nobility as it was for me; you catch my drift?”

  “Very sound,” Renoir Gerade said.

  “Nonsense!” Mirabeau growled. “Any Riquetti whatsoever will be absolutely formidable. We always have been from the time the original Arrighettis—that was our true name—fled Florence with the Guelfs on their heels; we Riquettis have never produced a weakling! My grandfather, old Col d’Argent, silver stock, they called him, lived to beget my father after holding the bridge at Casono single-handed, and taking twenty-seven Wounds, any one of which would have killed an ordinary man. He married with his head held to his neck with a bar of silver, lived out a long life like that, got sons! I tell you two damned Jacobins——”

  “A strange epithet,” Jean smiled, “from one who frequents the Jacobin Club, and who has recently been suggested for the office of president of that organisation.”

  “I,” Mirabeau roared, “would frequent hell itself, and consort with the devil, if I thought by so doing I could save France!”

  “Well spoken,” M. Gerade said quietly; “but the fact remains that the House of Bourbon, which produced many great and noble men, has lately produced mostly scoundrels and fools. We can suffer that of the crown, because one house we can control; but a hereditary nobility, M. Mirabeau, has produced surprisingly few Riquettis—and too many wastrels, coxcombs, and blackguards. I agree with M. Marin.”

  “All right, all right!” Mirabeau growled; “disagree if you will. The point is not important now. What is at issue at the moment is saving the crown. I take it we are all agreed upon that?”

  “We are,” Jean Paul said.

  “Good. You two will be my lieutenants in this enterprise. My plan is simple—and it is also the only feasible one: the King must leave Paris!”

  “For where?” Jean said.

  “Ah, but you are keen, Marin! That is precisely the point of points! The Queen, unfortunately, seems to want him to cross the border and depend upon foreign intervention—which is natural to her, since she is not French. But that would be—”

  “Suicide,” Renoir Gerade remarked dryly.

  “Exactly! They would never reach the border. And they would stand in the eyes of all Frenchmen as traitors to France. The Cordeliers want exactly that, to launch their filthy republic in which Danton, Desmoulins, Marat et al would gain the power into their filthy hands. Part of the Jacobins want exactly the same thing—especially the faction that Robespierre dominates. I, on the other hand, being of no party and committed to no one, can think clearly, you understand. The provinces are intensely loyal to the crown. The King must flee to the Midi, you comprehend, and appeal publicly to all Frenchmen to flock to him to restore the monarchy, agreeing beforehand to stand by the limitations already imposed upon him.”

  “It would mean war,” Jean sighed, “civil war, M. Mirabeau.”

  “And what have we now, mon vieux? Oh, la, la! A tea-party? I prefer war which has at least organisation and discipline, and out of which something might come, to this anarchy, in which poules and bullies and pimps in the gallery control the National Assembly of France at the behest of Philip of Orleans. Don’t you?”

  “And if her Majesty,” Gerade said quietly, “refuses to permit the fat simpleton to stand by his word after he has given it—what then, M. le Comte?”

  “Ah, therein lies the danger,” Mirabeau groaned. “We want a strong throne; but what is to be done with a King who cannot even control his own wife? How in God’s name can we ever expect him to truly rule his kingdom?”

  I, Jean thought wryly, sympathise with him. I fear that the Queen is much like Lucienne. And neither of us, Louis of France nor I, have sense enough to give up what we cannot manage. But he didn’t say it. What he said was:

  “Then we must appeal to the Queen.”

  “Excellent! But h
ow? I finally succeeded in seeing both of them on the third of this month. The fat one had nothing to say; so I talked to her. At the time I thought I’d won her, surely; but every day I grow less certain. The point is I must have another interview with her—and her alone. But she now refuses to see me. She considers both me and that fool de Lafayette traitors, never dreaming that a man’s loyalty should be to the nation, not his class.”

  He stopped and stared at Jean Paul.

  “You!” he said; “you could do it! I’ll wager you could get an interview with her. Look at the points in your favour: you have never been a noble, but you were brought up like one—nay, better. I’m told your manners are exquisite when you want them to be. Gerade told me a wild story of your masquerading as an Italian prince once, and getting away with it. . . .”

  “No,” Jean Paul said flatly, “no more disguises, and other such folly.”

  “Hear me out. You’ll go as you are, well but soberly dressed, and present yourself as a loyal subject who desires most of all to serve Her Majesty.”

  “All of which is true enough,” Jean said; “but what are you going to do about this face of mine? You want the Queen to have hysterics?”

  “She’s made of sterner stuff than that,” Mirabeau said; “you can tell her you got the scar in one of the wars—Corsica perhaps! And——”

  “No,” Jean said; “I won’t do it. In the first place, I won’t lie. In the second——”

  “But you must do it, Jeannot!” Lucienne’s lovely voice Sounded through the crack of the door; “for my sake. Then you can come back and—”

  “Damn my eyes!” Mirabeau roared, “an eavesdropper! Come in, Mile Talbot—and let us decide whether we can permit you to leave this house alive.”

  Lucienne pushed the door half open and slipped in quickly, closing it behind her.

  “How perfectly thrilling!” she breathed; “to be invited to a council of State. I’m sorry I eavesdropped; but I truly couldn’t help it. You left me so long, Jeannot. Half those Muscadines in there were trying to take me home with them—and for quite improper purposes, you comprehend. And then you men were roaring so! Fine conspirators you are! Eavesdrop? Why, M’sieur le Comte, you could be heard fully ten yards away from the door.”

  “Enfer!” Mirabeau swore, then burst out laughing. “You have right, Mademoiselle, I am perhaps the most futile of conspirators. I would do many things, but nobody trusts me. They think me dishonest because in my youth to live I did many things. But ‘twas the world that rejected me—not I the world. I have always been fully conscious of my powers. . . . But enough of this. You are an ally, I think, Mile Talbot. You must persuade him. This he must do—or perhaps France is lost. If someone, anyone, could convince the Queen that she must not treat with Austria, England, Russia, Spain—that she must depend upon the good people of France. . . .”

  “How can she?” Lucienne observed, “when they spit at her and call her Austrian, foreign woman—and things even worse?”

  “True,” Mirabeau groaned, “but Marie Antoinette is, malheureusement, King of France—we have no other! Fat Louis—what is he, hein? A good locksmith, I’m told—a fine hunter. But a King—pah! He obeys his Queen as though he were an infant and she his mother; he has no mind of his own, no force, no. Sacré bleu! They gave him an operation so that he could make children, heirs to the throne—and God alone knows, apart from l’Autrichienne herself and Count Fersen, whether fat Louis made them or not, or whether he had less royal assistance. I rave—forgive me. . . .”

  He paused, looking sternly at Jean Paul.

  “You must convince her, mon ami, that if she does not cooperate with us in this matter—she will die at the hands of regicides. She, her husband, and her children—and France, God help her—will be lost. Come, M. Marin—what do you say?”

  “He will, of course,” Lucienne answered for him. “I will see to it. Of course it will take a bit of persuasion; but I’ve been told I am very good at changing people’s minds. Why not leave him in my hands a day or two, M’sieur le Comte? I think I can guarantee results.”

  “Good!” Mirabeau laughed; “but only a day or two, my enchantress, time runs out—and grave issues are at stake.”

  “Why can’t M. Gerade do these things?” Jean growled; “he’s so much more presentable than I, and a seasoned diplomat to boot.”

  “I,” Renoir Gerade smiled, “am but a rough soldier. I’ve heard you turn a phrase, Marin, to the last courtly hair. ‘Tis that we need. No, you must allow yourself to be persuaded—which, if I may say so, should be a most pleasant occupation.”

  “Oh, I’ll persuade him all right,” Lucienne laughed. “Come, Jeannot—I am anxious to commence persuading you. . . .”

  “Bonne chance!” Mirabean roared; “how I envy you!”

  “I think,” Jean Paul said dryly, when the fiacre had brought them once more to Lucienne’s abode, “it is time I returned to my own flat. I have not slept there for five nights, and my friends will grow concerned. . . .”

  Lucienne looked at him. Then she laughed merrily.

  “Tired of me?” she whispered, “or afraid of being persuaded—which?”

  “Neither,” Jean growled. “Afraid perhaps of losing my immortal soul!”

  “Help me down,” Lucienne said. “You need not fear that, I think—for strangely enough you are very like those maidens of the Mohammedan Paradise: you renew your virginity, your spiritual virginity, I mean, after each time with me. You really are pure at heart, Jeannot—and it maddens me. I wish I could really corrupt you; but then, with your talents, if I could, I should only lose you. So perhaps it’s better like this.”

  Jean got down and lifted her to the earth.

  She clung to him, whispering: “Come up with me, Jeannot—for a little time at least. You don’t know what torture it was to chatter with those fools, and wait, and wait. . . . Come, my love, my old, old love—my first, and perhaps my last. . . .”

  “One does not count the ones in between, eh?” Jean mocked, or the little extra ones at the same time on the side?”

  “Of course not!” Lucienne laughed. “One should be permitted the condiments to give the main dish spice! Besides, all the little ways I have of diverting you so marvelously, how else could I have learned them, mon pauvre? You should be grateful for the others, for truly you have benefited thereby!”

  “Morbleu!” Jean swore.

  Don’t swear, my love. And think not of persuasions or my other loves, or of anything that will push us apart. For ‘tis I who have need of you, now. Ah, Jeannot, I burn, I melt—’tis insupportable! You are kind; and to leave me now would be a fiendish cruelty. . . . Come with me, my great stallion, my fine, splendid wild beast—come with me, come!”

  Lost, Jean groaned inside his heart, always and for ever lost. . . .

  But in the morning, before it was light, he rose and dressed very quietly in the darkness. He was tying his stock when he became aware that she was watching him, her great eyes half luminous in the gloom.

  “Where are you going?” she whispered.

  “To the Salle a Manège,” he said flatly, “to resign my post. I have had enough of politics—enough of all the things in life I cannot manage. I want quiet now, and peace. . . .”

  “All the things you cannot manage,” she mocked; “but that includes me, does it not? Are you leaving me, then?”

  “Yes,” Jean snapped, “yes, I am.”

  “You will come back,” Lucienne laughed. “You will always come back to me. For no one else on earth can take my place—especially not that soft little brunette child I saw you with at the fête. . . . What’s her name? Flower—ah, that’s it, Fleurette, little flower. She seems very sweet and gentle. Such a one, mon Jeannot, is not for you.”

  “Why not?” Jean said.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Lucienne said airily; “perhaps because you would die of boredom the first week you spent with her. Or more likely because never in your life would you have done with compari
ng her with me—to her detriment.”

  Jean waited, staring at her.

  “Run along to the Tuileries if you will. Resign your post—it matters not. What does matter is this business of the Queen. That, too, you’ll do—because you’ve never in your life failed to do your duty, mon petit bourgeois! And that is your duty. Besides, I want to sleep all day. Sleep is the most voluptuous thing in the world-especially after a night of love.”

  Jean did not answer her. There is never any answer I can give her, he thought bitterly; she is always too complete and too clear for me. She knows me, I think, better than I know myself. . . .

  “Adieu,” he said, and started towards the door.

  “Not adieu, Jeannot—au ‘voir,” she said lazily. “I’ll see you tonight. . . .”

  Jean pushed open the door and went down the stairs in a quiet kind of terror. I must escape her, he thought, I must! I’ll go down to the Côte—pray God, they’re wrong, and Nicole is alive. With her alone could I be free of this lovely witch. Fleurette, poor little thing, could scarcely prove enough of a diversion; still—who knows?

  At the Riding School it was the same as he remembered it, only worse. There was no order at all. At times a hundred deputies were on their feet, shouting at Mounier, the current President, trying each of them to be heard. In the galleries gigantic Théroigne, the queen of the poules of Paris, was commanding her claque of fishwomen and prostitutes and their hangers-on to drown the speakers whose views proved unpopular to the mob, and to cheer to the echo any measure, however idiotic, that pleased them.

  In such captivity did the National Assembly hold its daily meetings. No wonder then, Jean realised, that nothing of value could be accomplished. Of all the deputies, only he and Mirabeau refused to flatter the base passions of the canaille.

  As he entered, the fishwives were shrieking:

  “Who is that spouter? Silence the babbler—he doesn’t know what he’s gabbing about! Let Papa Mirabeau speak, we want to hear him! Bread at six sous the four pounds! Meat, six sous the pound! No more, you idiots! We aren’t children to be played with! We are ready to strike! Do as you are told!”