Part 45 (1/2)
A dozen such protests on the instant. But the wily veteran was ready.
He knew that when a mob stops to parley the battle is half won.
”Oh, yes, messieurs,--singly, or as other good citizens, you are right; but not as----”
A young man reached over his comrades' shoulders and struck the old commissaire in the face with his cane.
”For shame!” cried Jean Marot, indignantly. ”What foolishness!” And he broke the cane across his knee and threw the fragments to the ground.
In the same moment the old commissaire dashed into the crowd and single-handed dragged his youthful a.s.sailant to the front and clear of his companions.
”The guard! the guard! Look out, comrades! here comes the guard!”
The cry ran along the line and through the ranks hushed by the wanton blow delivered unnecessarily upon a respected official. A company of the Garde Republicaine a pied had filed out across the Boulevard du Palais from behind the Prefecture; another company a cheval debouched into the quai from the other corner, and now rode slowly down towards the bridge.
”Bayonets in front and sabres on the flank!” said Jean to those around him. ”It were wise to get out of this.”
”Good advice, young man,--get out! It won't do, you see. You must cross singly, or as other citizens. Never mind your hot-headed young friend,” added the old man, kindly, as he wiped the blood from his face. ”We won't be hard on him. Only, you must go back at once!”
He talked to them as if they were little children. But they needed no further urging. The rear-guard had already turned tail at the sight of the troops and were in full retreat. Before the last man had cleared the bridge the only one who had been arrested was set at liberty, though he had richly earned six months in jail.
And thus terminated the harebrained attempt to march five hundred riotous men through the city directly in front of the Prefecture, where lay unlimited reserves, civil and military, under arms. The royalists had somewhat overstrained the complaisance of the authorities.
Acting at once on the hint of the police official, the crowd broke up into small groups. ”a la Concorde! a la Concorde! Concorde!” they cried.
This revolutionary rendezvous was prearranged to mean Place du Carrousel, conditional on police interference. It was to deceive the authorities, the main object being to form a junction with the antic.i.p.ated hordes from Montmartre and La Villette.
But a mob broken into scattered groups is no longer a mob, and being no longer a mob, there is no longer courage or cohesion of purpose.
Instead of some four hundred students and about a hundred roughs, not more than fifty of the former responded at the foot of the Gambetta monument, while the latter cla.s.s had gathered strength by the way.
This discrepancy, though painfully apparent to Jean Marot and his friends, in no wise dampened their ardor. Their chosen speakers lashed them into fresh furors of patriotism while they waited. The eloquent young man who quoted the words of Gambetta engraved on his monument wrung tears from his sympathetic auditors. These words of wisdom and patriotism had no pertinence whatever to the work in hand,--which was to break up a meeting organized by some distinguished philanthropists, scholars, and their friends in the interests of civil liberty and the perpetuity of human rights,--but everything serves as fuel to a flame well started.
Carried away by the spirit of exaltation, Jean Marot clambered upon the monument itself, and ascending the heroic figure of Gambetta amid the wild plaudits of the mob, kissed the mute stone lips. His hat had fallen to the ground, and now the hysterical crowd tore it into bits and scrambled for the pieces, which they pinned on their b.r.e.a.s.t.s as precious souvenirs of the occasion.
When Jean reached the earth it was to be frantically embraced on every side. A great, broad-shouldered, big-bearded man in a cap and the blouse of the artisan crowned this exciting ceremony by kissing the young student full on the mouth.
A score of hats were tendered, but Jean accepted the cap of the stalwart workman, who immediately brandished his club and shouted ”En avant!” He unwound his soiled red sash as he started, and, making it deftly into a sort of turban, const.i.tuted himself Jean's special body-guard for the day.
The strong force of police posted in the neighborhood of the Louvre had regarded this street drama with stoical indifference. When the noisy crowd surged into the Rue de Rivoli it pa.s.sed between the mounted videttes of the Garde Republicaine. Farther on, in the Rue St.
Honore, a squad of dismounted cuira.s.siers stood listlessly holding the bridles of their horses. The afternoon sun flashed electric rays from the plates of burnished steel.
”Vive l'armee!” burst from the mob.
A subaltern on the curb touched his glittering casque in military salute without stirring a muscle of his armored body.
Now recognized leader, Jean directed the march up the narrow Rue de Richelieu, observing to his bearded aide that it was more direct and safe, though shouts of ”Avenue de l'Opera! l'Opera!” rose from his followers. Jean paid no attention to these cries.
”You are right, my boy!” said the man in the blouse, patting Jean on the shoulder approvingly. ”The broad streets are to the agents and military. The cuira.s.siers can there trample men like flies! Ah! with a regiment of cavalry and a battery of three quick-firers one could hold Paris at the Place de l'Opera against the world!”
”Yes, my friend,” answered Jean, with a smile, ”always provided the world agreed not to drop thousand-pound melinite sh.e.l.ls on one from Mont Valerien or Montmartre, or from some other place.”