CHAPTER 62
Vive Colbert!
The spectacle which the Greve now presented was a frightful
one. The heads, leveled by the perspective, extended afar,
thick and agitated as the ears of corn in a vast plain. From
time to time a fresh report, or a distant rumor, made the
heads oscillate and thousands of eyes flash. Now and then
there were great movements. All those ears of corn bent, and
became waves more agitated than those of the ocean, which
rolled from the extremities to the center, and beat, like
the tides, against the hedge of archers who surrounded the
gibbets. Then the handles of the halberds were let fall upon
the heads and shoulders of the rash invaders; at times,
also, it was the steel as well as the wood, and, in that
case, a large empty circle was formed around the guard; a
space conquered upon the extremities, which underwent, in
their turn the oppression of the sudden movement, which
drove them against the parapets of the Seine. From the
window, that commanded a view of the whole Place, D'Artagnan
saw, with interior satisfaction, that such of the musketeers
and guards as found themselves involved in the crowd, were
able, with blows of their fists and the hilts of their
swords, to keep room. He even remarked that they had
succeeded, by that esprit de corps which doubles the
strength of the soldier, in getting together in one group to
the amount of about fifty men; and that, with the exception
of a dozen stragglers whom he still saw rolling here and
there, the nucleus was complete, and within reach of his
voice. But it was not the musketeers and guards only that
drew the attention of D'Artagnan. Around the gibbets, and
particularly at the entrances to the arcade of Saint Jean,
moved a noisy mass, a busy mass; daring faces, resolute
demeanors were to be seen here and there, mingled with silly
faces and indifferent demeanors; signals were exchanged,
hands given and taken. D'Artagnan remarked among the groups,
and those groups the most animated, the face of the cavalier
whom he had seen enter by the door of communication from his
garden, and who had gone upstairs to harangue the drinkers.
That man was organizing troops and giving orders.
"Mordioux!" said D'Artagnan to himself, "I was not deceived;
I know that man, -- it is Menneville. What the devil is he
doing here?"
A distant murmur, which became more distinct by degrees,
stopped this reflection, and drew his attention another way.
This murmur was occasioned by the arrival of the culprits; a
strong picket of archers preceded them, and appeared at the
angle of the arcade. The entire crowd now joined as if in
one cry; all the cries united formed one immense howl.
D'Artagnan saw Raoul was becoming pale, and he slapped him
roughly on the shoulder. The fire-keepers turned round on
hearing the great cry, and asked what was going on. "The
condemned are arrived," said D'Artagnan. "That's well,"
replied they, again replenishing the fire. D'Artagnan looked
at them with much uneasiness; it was evident that these men
who were making such a fire for no apparent purpose had some
strange intentions. The condemned appeared upon the Place.
They were walking, the executioner before them, whilst fifty
archers formed a hedge on their right and their left. Both
were dressed in black; they appeared pale, but firm. They
looked impatiently over the people's heads, standing on
tip-toe at every step. D'Artagnan remarked this. "Mordioux!"
cried he, "they are in a great hurry to get a sight of the
gibbet!" Raoul drew back, without, however, having the power
to leave the window. Terror even has its attractions.
"To the death! to the death!" cried fifty thousand voices.
"Yes; to the death!" howled a hundred frantic others, as if
the great mass had given them the reply.
"To the halter! to the halter!" cried the great whole; "Vive
le roi!"
"Well," said D'Artagnan, "this is droll; I should have
thought it was M. Colbert who had caused them to be hung."
There was, at this moment, a great rolling movement in the
crowd, which stopped for a moment the march of the
condemned. The people of a bold and resolute mien, whom
D'Artagnan had observed, by dint of pressing, pushing, and
lifting themselves up, had succeeded in almost touching the
hedge of archers. The cortege resumed its march. All at
once, to cries of "Vive Colbert!" those men, of whom
D'Artagnan never lost sight, fell upon the escort, which in
vain endeavored to stand against them. Behind these men was
the crowd. Then commenced, amidst a frightful tumult, as
frightful a confusion. This time there was something more
than cries of expectation or cries of joy, there were cries
of pain. Halberds struck men down, swords ran them through,
muskets were discharged at them. The confusion became then
so great that D'Artagnan could no longer distinguish
anything. Then, from this chaos, suddenly surged something
like a visible intention, like a will pronounced. The
condemned had been torn from the hands of the guards, and
were being dragged towards the house of
L'Image-de-Notre-Dame. Those who dragged them shouted, "Vive
Colbert!" The people hesitated, not knowing which they ought
to fall upon, the archers or the aggressors. What stopped
the people was, that those who cried "Vive Colbert!" began
to cry, at the same time, "No halter! no halter! to the
fire! to the fire! burn the thieves! burn the extortioners!"
This cry, shouted with an ensemble, obtained enthusiastic
success. The populace had come to witness an execution, and
here was an opportunity offered them of performing one
themselves. It was this that must be most agreeable to the
populace: therefore, they ranged, themselves immediately on
the party of the aggressors against the archers, crying with
the minority, which had become, thanks to them, the most
compact majority: "Yes, yes: to the fire with the thieves!
Vive Colbert!"
"Mordioux!" exclaimed D'Artagnan, "this begins to look
serious."
One of the men who remained near the chimney approached the
window, a firebrand in his hand. "Ah, ah!" said he, "it gets
warm." Then, turning to his companion: "There is the
signal," added he; and he immediately applied the burning
brand to the wainscoting. Now, this cabaret of the
Image-de-Notre-Dame was not a very newly-built house, and
therefore did not require much entreating to take fire. In a
second the boards began to crackle, and the flames arose
sparkling to the ceiling. A howling from without replied to
the shouts of the incendiaries. D'Artagnan, who had not seen
what passed, from being engaged at the window, felt, at the
same time, the smoke which choked him and the fire that
scorched him. "Hola!" cried he, turning round, "is the fire
here? Are you drunk or mad, my masters?"
The two men looked at each other with an air of
astonishment. "In what?" asked they of D'Artagnan; "was it
not a thing agreed upon?"
"A thing agreed upon that you should burn my house!"
vociferated D'Artagnan, snatching the brand from the hand of
the incendiary, and striking him with it across the face.
The second wanted to assist his comrade, but Raoul, seizing
him by the middle, threw him out of the window, whilst
D'Artagnan pushed his man down the stairs. Raoul, first
disengaged, tore the burning wainscoting down, and threw it
flaming into the chamber. At a glance D'Artagnan saw there
was nothing to be feared from the fire, and sprang to the
window. The disorder was at its height. The air was filled
with simultaneous cries of "To the fire!" "To the death!"
"To the halter!" "To the stake!" "Vive Colbert!" "Vive le
roi!" The group which had forced the culprits from the hands
of the archers had drawn close to the house, which appeared
to be the goal towards which they dragged them. Menneville
was at the head of this group, shouting louder than all the
others, "To the fire! to the fire! Vive Colbert!" D'Artagnan
began to comprehend what was meant. They wanted to burn the
condemned, and his house was to serve as a funeral pile.
"Halt, there!" cried he, sword in hand, and one foot upon
the window. "Menneville, what do you want to do?"
"Monsieur d'Artagnan," cried the latter; "give way, give
way!"
"To the fire! to the fire with the thieves! Vive Colbert!"
These cries exasperated D'Artagnan. "Mordioux!" said he.
"What! burn the poor devils who are only condemned to be
hung? that is infamous!"
Before the door, however, the mass of anxious spectators,
rolled back against the walls, had become more thick, and
closed up the way. Menneville and his men, who were dragging
along the culprits, were within ten paces of the door.
Menneville made a last effort. "Passage! passage!" cried he,
pistol in hand.
"Burn them! burn them!" repeated the crowd. "The
Image-de-Notre-Dame is on fire! Burn the thieves! burn the
monopolists in the Image-de-Notre-Dame!"
There now remained no doubt, it was plainly D'Artagnan's
house that was their object. D'Artagnan remembered the old
cry, always so effective from his mouth:
"A moi! mousquetaires!" shouted he, with the voice of a
giant, with one of those voices which dominate over cannon,
the sea, the tempest. "A moi! mousquetaires!" And suspending
himself by the arm from the balcony, he allowed himself to
drop amidst the crowd, which began to draw back from a house
that rained men. Raoul was on the ground as soon as he, both
sword in hand. All the musketeers on the Place heard that
challenging cry -- all turned round at that cry, and
recognized D'Artagnan. "To the captain, to the captain!"
cried they, in their turn. And the crowd opened before them
as though before the prow of a vessel. At that moment
D'Artagnan and Menneville found themselves face to face.
"Passage, passage!" cried Menneville, seeing that he was
within an arm's length of the door.
"No one passes here," said D'Artagnan.
"Take that, then!" said Menneville, firing his pistol,
almost within arm's length. But before the cock fell,
D'Artagnan had struck up Menneville's arm with the hilt of
his sword and passed the blade through his body.
"I told you plainly to keep yourself quiet," said D'Artagnan
to Menneville, who rolled at his feet.
"Passage! passage!" cried the companions of Menneville, at
first terrified, but soon recovering, when they found they
had only to do with two men. But those two men were
hundred-armed giants, the swords flew about in their hands
like the burning glaive of the archangel. They pierce with
its point, strike with the flat, cut with the edge, every
stroke brings down a man. "For the king!" cried D'Artagnan,
to every man he struck at, that is to say, to every man that
fell. This cry became the charging word for the musketeers,
who guided by it, joined D'Artagnan. During this time the
archers, recovering from the panic they had undergone,
charge the aggressors in the rear, and regular as mill
strokes, overturn or knock down all that oppose them. The
crowd, which sees swords gleaming, and drops of blood flying
in the air -- the crowd falls back and crushes itself. At
length cries for mercy and of despair resound; that is, the
farewell of the vanquished. The two condemned are again in
the hands of the archers. D'Artagnan approaches them, seeing
them pale and sinking: "Console yourselves, poor men," said
he, "you will not undergo the frightful torture with which
these wretches threatened you. The king has condemned you to
be hung: you shall only be hung. Go on, hang them, and it
will be over."
There is no longer anything going on at the
Image-de-Notre-Dame. The fire has been extinguished with two
tuns of wine in default of water. The conspirators have fled
by the garden. The archers were dragging the culprits to the
gibbets. From this moment the affair did not occupy much
time. The executioner, heedless about operating according to
the rules of art, made such haste that he dispatched the
condemned in a couple of minutes. In the meantime the people
gathered around D'Artagnan, -- they felicitated, they
cheered him. He wiped his brow, streaming with sweat, and
his sword, streaming with blood. He shrugged his shoulders
at seeing Menneville writhing at his feet in the last
convulsions. And, while Raoul turned away his eyes in
compassion, he pointed to the musketeers the gibbets laden
with their melancholy fruit. "Poor devils!" said he, "I hope
they died blessing me, for I saved them with great
difficulty." These words caught the ear of Menneville at the
moment when he himself was breathing his last sigh. A dark,
ironical smile flitted across his lips, he wished to reply,
but the effort hastened the snapping of the chord of life --
he expired.
"Oh! all this is very frightful!" murmured Raoul: "let us
begone, monsieur le chevalier."
"You are not wounded?" asked D'Artagnan.
"Not at all, thank you."
"That's well! Thou art a brave fellow, mordioux! The head of
the father, and the arm of Porthos. Ah! if he had been here,
good Porthos, you would have seen something worth looking
at." Then as if by way of remembrance --
"But where the devil can that brave Porthos be?" murmured
D'Artagnan.
"Come, chevalier, pray come away," urged Raoul.
"One minute, my friend, let me take my thirty-seven and a
half pistoles and I am at your service. The house is a good
property," added D'Artagnan, as he entered the
Image-de-Notre-Dame, "but decidedly, even if it were less
profitable, I should prefer its being in another quarter."
