An Episode Under the Terror

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When the priest came to the Latin words, _Introibo ad altare Dei_, a
sudden divine inspiration flashed upon him; he looked at the three
kneeling figures, the representatives of Christian France, and said
instead, as though to blot out the poverty of the garret, "We are
about to enter the Sanctuary of God!"

These words, uttered with thrilling earnestness, struck reverent awe
into the nuns and the stranger. Under the vaulted roof of St. Peter's
at Rome, God would not have revealed Himself in greater majesty than
here for the eyes of the Christians in that poor refuge; so true is it
that all intermediaries between God and the soul of man are
superfluous, and all the grandeur of God proceeds from Himself alone.

The stranger's fervor was sincere. One emotion blended the prayers of
the four servants of God and the King in a single supplication. The
holy words rang like the music of heaven through the silence. At one
moment, tears gathered in the stranger's eyes. This was during the
_Pater Noster_; for the priest added a petition in Latin, and his
audience doubtless understood him when he said: "_Et remitte scelus
regicidis sicut Ludovicus eis remisit semetipse_"--forgive the
regicides as Louis himself forgave them.

The Sisters saw two great tears trace a channel down the stranger's
manly checks and fall to the floor. Then the office for the dead was
recited; the Domine salvum fac regem chanted in an undertone that went
to the hearts of the faithful Royalists, for they thought how the
child-King for whom they were praying was even then a captive in the
hands of his enemies; and a shudder ran through the stranger, as he
thought that a new crime might be committed, and that he could not
choose but take his part in it.

The service came to an end. The priest made a sign to the sisters, and
they withdrew. As soon as he was left alone with the stranger, he went
towards him with a grave, gentle face, and said in fatherly tones:

"My son, if your hands are stained with the blood of the royal martyr,
confide in me. There is no sin that may not be blotted out in the
sight of God by penitence as sincere and touching as yours appears to
be."

At the first words the man started with terror, in spite of himself.
Then he recovered composure, and looked quietly at the astonished
priest.

"Father," he said, and the other could not miss the tremor in his
voice, "no one is more guiltless than I of the blood shed----"

"I am bound to believe you," said the priest. He paused a moment, and
again he scrutinized his penitent. But, persisting in the idea that
the man before him was one of the members of the Convention, one of
the voters who betrayed an inviolable and anointed head to save their
own, he began again gravely:

"Remember, my son, that it is not enough to have taken no active part
in the great crime; that fact does not absolve you. The men who might
have defended the King and left their swords in their scabbards, will
have a very heavy account to render to the King of Heaven--Ah! yes,"
he added, with an eloquent shake of the head, "heavy indeed!--for by
doing nothing they became accomplices in the awful wickedness----"

"But do you think that an indirect participation will be punished?"
the stranger asked with a bewildered look. "There is the private
soldier commanded to fall into line--is he actually responsible?"

The priest hesitated. The stranger was glad; he had put the Royalist
precisian in a dilemma, between the dogma of passive obedience on the
one hand (for the upholders of the Monarchy maintained that obedience
was the first principle of military law), and the equally important
dogma which turns respect for the person of a King into a matter of
religion. In the priest's indecision he was eager to see a favorable
solution of the doubts which seemed to torment him. To prevent too
prolonged reflection on the part of the reverend Jansenist, he added:

"I should blush to offer remuneration of any kind for the funeral
service which you have just performed for the repose of the King's
soul and the relief of my conscience. The only possible return for
something of inestimable value is an offering likewise beyond price.
Will you deign, monsieur, to take my gift of a holy relic? A day will
perhaps come when you will understand its value."

As he spoke the stranger held out a box; it was very small and
exceedingly light. The priest took it mechanically, as it were, so
astonished was he by the man's solemn words, the tones of his voice,
and the reverence with which he held out the gift.

The two men went back together into the first room. The Sisters were
waiting for them.

"This house that you are living in belongs to Mucius Scaevola, the
plasterer on the first floor," he said. "He is well known in the
Section for his patriotism, but in reality he is an adherent of the
Bourbons. He used to be a huntsman in the service of his Highness the
Prince de Conti, and he owes everything to him. So long as you stay in
the house, you are safer here than anywhere else in France. Do not go
out. Pious souls will minister to your necessities, and you can wait
in safety for better times. Next year, on the 21st of January,"--he
could not hide an involuntary shudder as he spoke,--"next year, if you
are still in this dreary refuge, I will come back again to celebrate
the expiatory mass with you----"

He broke off, bowed to the three, who answered not a word, gave a last
look at the garret with its signs of poverty, and vanished.

Such an adventure possessed all the interest of a romance in the lives
of the innocent nuns. So, as soon as the venerable abbe told them the
story of the mysterious gift, it was placed upon the table, and by the
feeble light of the tallow dip an indescribable curiosity appeared in
the three anxious faces. Mademoiselle de Langeais opened the box, and
found a very fine lawn handkerchief, soiled with sweat; darker stains
appeared as they unfolded it.

"That is blood!" exclaimed the priest.

"It is marked with a royal crown!" cried Sister Agathe.

The women, aghast, allowed the precious relic to fall. For their
simple souls the mystery that hung about the stranger grew
inexplicable; as for the priest, from that day forth he did not even
try to understand it.



Before very long the prisoners knew that, in spite of the Terror, some
powerful hand was extended over them. It began when they received
firewood and provisions; and next the Sisters knew that a woman had
lent counsel to their protector, for linen was sent to them, and
clothes in which they could leave the house without causing remark
upon the aristocrat's dress that they had been forced to wear. After
awhile Mucius Scaevola gave them two civic cards; and often tidings
necessary for the priest's safety came to them in roundabout ways.
Warnings and advice reached them so opportunely that they could only
have been sent by some person in the possession of state secrets. And,
at a time when famine threatened Paris, invisible hands brought
rations of "white bread" for the proscribed women in the wretched
garret. Still they fancied that Citizen Mucius Scaevola was only the
mysterious instrument of a kindness always ingenious, and no less
intelligent.

The noble ladies in the garret could no longer doubt that their
protector was the stranger of the expiatory mass on the night of the
22nd of January, 1793; and a kind of cult of him sprung up among them.
Their one hope was in him; they lived through him. They added special
petitions for him to their prayers; night and morning the pious souls
prayed for his happiness, his prosperity, his safety; entreating God
to remove all snares far from his path, to deliver him from his
enemies, to grant him a long and peaceful life. And with this daily
renewed gratitude, as it may be called, there blended a feeling of
curiosity which grew more lively day by day. They talked over the
circumstances of his first sudden appearance, their conjectures were
endless; the stranger had conferred one more benefit upon them by
diverting their minds. Again, and again, they said, when he next came
to see them as he promised, to celebrate the sad anniversary of the
death of Louis XVI., he could not escape their friendship.

The night so impatiently awaited came at last. At midnight the old
wooden staircase echoed with the stranger's heavy footsteps. They had
made the best of their room for his coming; the altar was ready, and
this time the door stood open, and the two Sisters were out at the
stairhead, eager to light the way. Mademoiselle de Langeais even came
down a few steps, to meet their benefactor the sooner.

"Come," she said, with a quaver in the affectionate tones, "come in;
we are expecting you."

He raised his face, gave her a dark look, and made no answer. The
sister felt as if an icy mantle had fallen over her, and said no more.
At the sight of him, the glow of gratitude and curiosity died away in
their hearts. Perhaps he was not so cold, not so taciturn, not so
stern as he seemed to them, for in their highly wrought mood they were
ready to pour out their feeling of friendship. But the three poor
prisoners understood that he wished to be a stranger to them; and
submitted. The priest fancied that he saw a smile on the man's lips as
he saw their preparations for his visit, but it was at once repressed.
He heard mass, said his prayer, and then disappeared, declining, with
a few polite words, Mademoiselle de Langeais' invitation to partake of
the little collation made ready for him.

After the 9th Thermidor, the Sisters and the Abbe de Marolles could go
about Paris without the least danger. The first time that the abbe
went out he walked to a perfumer's shop at the sign of _The Queen of
Roses_, kept by the Citizen Ragon and his wife, court perfumers. The
Ragons had been faithful adherents of the Royalist cause; it was
through their means that the Vendean leaders kept up a correspondence
with the Princes and the Royalist Committee in Paris. The abbe, in the
ordinary dress of the time, was standing on the threshold of the shop
--which stood between Saint Roch and the Rue des Frondeurs--when he
saw that the Rue Saint Honore was filled with a crowd and he could not
go out.

"What is the matter?" he asked Madame Ragon.

"Nothing," she said; "it is only the tumbril cart and the executioner
going to the Place Louis XV. Ah! we used to see it often enough last
year; but to-day, four days after the anniversary of the twenty-first
of January, one does not feel sorry to see the ghastly procession."

"Why not?" asked the abbe. "That is not said like a Christian."

"Eh! but it is the execution of Robespierre's accomplices. They
defended themselves as long as they could, but now it is their turn to
go where they sent so many innocent people."

The crowd poured by like a flood. The abbe, yielding to an impulse of
curiosity, looked up above the heads, and there in the tumbril stood
the man who had heard mass in the garret three days ago.

"Who is it?" he asked; "who is the man with----"

"That is the headsman," answered M. Ragon, calling the executioner
--the _executeur des hautes oeuvres_--by the name he had borne under
the Monarchy.

"Oh! my dear, my dear! M. l'Abbe is dying!" cried out old Madame
Ragon. She caught up a flask of vinegar, and tried to restore the old
priest to consciousness.

"He must have given me the handkerchief that the King used to wipe his
brow on the way to his martyrdom," murmured he. " . . . Poor man!
. . . There was a heart in the steel blade, when none was found in all
France . . . "

The perfumers thought that the poor abbe was raving.



PARIS, January 183l.




ADDENDUM

The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.

Beauseant, Marquis and Comte de
Father Goriot

Ragon, M. and Mme.
Cesar Birotteau