Tom Burke Of "Ours", Volume I

CHAPTER XXXVI. THE PALAIS DE JUSTICE

“It will go hard with Moreau to-day,” said the elder of the two prisoners, a large, swarthy-looking Breton, in the dress of a sailor; “the Consul hates him.”

“Whom does he not hate,” said the younger, a slight and handsome youth – “whom does he not hate that ever rivalled him in glory? What love did he bear to Kléber or Desaix?”

“It is false,” said I, fiercely. “Bonaparte’s greatness stands far too high to feel such rivalry as theirs. The conqueror of Italy and of Egypt – ”

“Is a Corsican,” interrupted the elder.

“And a tyrant,” rejoined the other, in the same breath.

“These words become you well,” said I, bitterly. “Would that no stain lay on my honor, and I could make you eat them.”

“And who are you that dare to speak thus?” said the younger; “or how came one like you mixed up with men whose hearts were in a great cause, and who came to sell their lives upon it?”

“I tell you, boy,” broke in the elder, in a slow and measured tone, “I have made more stalwart limbs than thine bend, and stronger joints crack, for less than thou hast ventured to tell us; but sorrow and suffering are hard masters, and I can bear more now than I was wont to do. Let us have no more words.”

As he spoke, he leaned his head upon his hand, and turned towards the wall; the other, too, sat down in a comer of the cell, and was silent. And thus we remained for hours long.

The dreary stillness, made more depressing by the presence of the two prisoners, whose deep-drawn breathings were the only sounds they uttered, had something unspeakably sad and melancholy in it, and more than once I felt sorry for the few words I had spoken, which separated those whose misfortunes should have made them brothers.

A confused and distant hum, swelling and falling at intervals, now filled the air, and gradually I could distinguish the shouts of people at a distance. This increased as it came nearer; and then I heard the tramping noise of many feet, and of a great multitude of people passing in the street below, and suddenly a wild cheer broke forth, “Vive le Consul!” “Vive Bonaparte!” followed the next instant by the clanking sound of a cavalry escort, while the cry grew louder and louder, and the vivas drowned all other sounds.

“You hear them, Guillaume, you hear them,” said the sailor to the other prisoner; “That shout is our death-cry. Bonaparte comes not here to-day but to see his judges do his bidding.”

“What care I?” said the other, fiercely. “The guillotine or the sabre, the axe or the bayonet, – it is all one. We knew what must come of it.”

The door opened as he spoke, and a greffier of the tribunal appeared with four gendarmes.

“Come, Messieurs,” said he, “the court is waiting for you.”

“And how go matters without, sir?” said the elder, in an easy tone.

“Badly for the prisoners,” said the greffier, shaking his head. “Monsieur Moreau, the general’s brother, has done much injury; he has insulted the Consul.”

“Bravely done!” cried the younger man, with enthusiasm. “It is well he should hear truth one day, though the tongue that uttered it should be cold the next.”

“Move on, sir!” said the greffier, sternly. “Not you,” added he, as I pressed forward after the rest; “your time has not come.”

“Would that it had!” said I, as the door closed upon me, and I was left in total solitude.

The day was over, and the evening already late, when a turnkey appeared, and desired me to follow him. A moody indifference to everything had settled on me, and I never spoke as I walked behind him down corridor after corridor; and across a court, into a large, massive-looking building, whose grated windows and strongly-barred doors reminded me of the Temple.

“Here is your cell,” said he, roughly, as he unlocked a low door near the entrance.

“It is gloomy enough,” said I, with a sad smile.

“And yet many have shed tears to leave it before now,” rejoined he, with a savage twinkle of his small eyes.

I was glad when the hoarse crash of the closed door told me I was alone; and I threw myself upon my bed and buried my face in my hands.

There is a state which is not sleep, and yet is akin to it, into which grief can bring us, – a half-dreary stupor, where only sorrows are felt; and even they come dulled and blunted, as if time and years had softened down their sting. But no ray of hope shines there, – a dreary waste, without a star. The cold, dark sea, boundless and bleak, is not more saddening than life then seems before us; there is neither path to follow nor goal to reach, and an apathy worse than death creeps over all our faculties. And yet, when we awake we wish for this again. Into this state I sank, and when morning came felt sorry that the light should shine into my narrow cell, and rouse me from my stupor. When the turnkey entered to bring me breakfast, I turned towards the wall, and trembled lest he should speak to me; and it was with a strange thrill I heard the door close as he went out. The abandonment of one’s sorrow – that daily, hourly indulgence in grief which the uncheered solitude of a prison begets – soon brings the mind to the narrow range of one or two topics. With the death of hope, all fancy and imagination perish, the springs of all speculation are dried up, and every faculty bent towards one point; the reason, like a limb unexercised, wastes and pines, and becomes paralyzed.

Now and then the thought would flash across me, “What if this were madness?” – and I shuddered not at the thought. Such had my prison made me.

Four days and nights passed over thus, – a long, monotonous dream, in which I counted not the time, – and I lay upon my straw bed watching the expiring light of the candle with that strange interest one attaches to everything within the limits of a prison-cell. The flame waned and flickered: now lighting up for a second the cold gray walls, scratched with many a prisoner’s name; now subsiding, it threw strange and fitful shapes upon them, – figures that seemed to move and to beckon to one another, – goblin outlines, wild and fanciful. Then came a bright flash as the wick fell, and all was dark.

“If the dead do but sleep!” was the first thought that crossed my mind as the gloom of total night wrapped every object about me, and a stillness most appalling prevailed. Suddenly I heard the sounds of a heavy bolt withdrawn and a door opening; then a low, rushing noise, like wind blowing through a narrow corridor; and at last the marching sounds of feet, and the accents of men speaking together: nearer and nearer they came, and at length halted at the door of my cell. A cold, faint feeling, the sickness of the heart, crept over me; the hour, the sounds, reminded me of what so often I had heard men speak of in the Temple, and the dread of assassination made me tremble from head to foot. The light streamed from beneath the door, and reached to my bed; and I calculated the number of steps it would take before they approached me. The key grated in the lock and the door opened slowly, and three men stood at the entrance. I sprang up wildly to my feet; a sudden impulse of self-defence seized me; and with a wild shout for them to come on, I rushed forward. My foot, however, caught the angle of the iron bedstead, and I fell headlong and senseless to the ground.

Some interval elapsed; and when next I felt consciousness, I was lying full length on my bed, the cell lit up by two candles on the table, beside which sat two men, their heads bent eagerly over a mass of papers before them. One was an old and venerable-looking man, his white hair and long queue so bespeaking him; he wore a loose cloth cloak that covered his entire figure, but I could see that a brass scabbard of a sword projected beneath it; on the chair beside him, too, there lay a foraging-cap. The other, much younger, though still not in youth, was a thin, pale, careworn man; his forehead was high and strongly marked; and there was an intensity and determination in his brow and about the angles of his mouth most striking; he was dressed in black, with deep ruffles at his wrist.

“It is quite clear. General,” said he, in a low and measured voice, where each word fell with perfect distinctness – “it is quite clear that they can press a conviction here if they will. The allegations are so contrived as rather to indicate complicity than actually establish it. The defence in such cases has to combat shadows, not overturn facts; and, believe me, a procureur-général, aided by a police, is a dexterous enemy.”

“I have no doubt of it,” said the general, rapidly; “but what are the weak points? where is he most assailable?”

“Everywhere,” said the other. “To begin: the secret information of the outbreak between Lord Whitworth and the Consul; the frequent meetings with the Marquis de Beauvais; the false report to the Chef de Police; the concealment of this abbe – By the bye, I am not quite clear about that part of the case; why have not the prosecution brought this Abbé, forward? It is plain they have his evidence, and can produce him if they will; and I see no other name in the act of accusation than our old acquaintance, Mehée de la Touche – ”

“The villain!” cried the general, with a stamp of indignation, while a convulsive spasm seemed to shake every fibre of his frame.

“Mehée de la Touche!” said I to myself; “I have heard that name before.” And like a lightning flash it crossed my mind that such was the name of the man Marie de Meudon charged me with knowing.

“But still,” said the general, “what can they make of all these? That of indiscretion, folly, breach of discipline, if you will; but – ”

“Wait a little,” said the other, quietly. “Then comes the night of the château, in which he is found among the Chouan party in their very den, taking part in the defence.”

“No, no! Lamoriciére, who commanded the cuirassiers, can establish the fact beyond question, that Burke took no part in the affray, and delivered his sword at once when called on.”

“At least they found him there, and on his person the brevet of colonel, signed by Monsieur himself.”

“Of that I can give no explanation,” replied the general; “but I am in possession of such information as can account for his presence at the château, and establish his innocence on that point.”

“Indeed!” cried the advocate, for such he was; “with that much may be done.”

“Unhappily, however,” rejoined the general, “if such a disclosure is not necessary to save his life, I cannot venture to give it; the ruin of another must follow the explanation.”

“Without it he is lost,” said the advocate, solemnly.

“And would not accept of life with it,” said I, boldly, as I started up in my bed, and looked fixedly at them.

The general sprang back, astonished and speechless; but the advocate, with more command over his emotions, cast his eyes upon the paper before him, and quickly asked, —

“And the commission; how do you account for that?”

“It was offered to and refused by me. He who made the proposal forgot it on my table, and I was about to restore it when I was made prisoner.”

“What condition was attached to your acceptance of it?”

“Some vague, indistinct proposals were made to me to join a conspiracy of which I was neither told the object nor intentions. Indeed, I stopped any disclosure by rejecting the bribe.”

“Who made these same proposals?”

“I shall not tell his name.”

“No matter,” said the advocate, carelessly; “it was the Marquis de Beauvais;” And then, as if affecting to write, I saw his sharp eyes glance over towards me, while a smile of gratified cunning twitched his lip. “You will have no objection to say how first you became acquainted with him?”

The dexterity of this query, by replying to which I at once established his preceding assumption, completely escaped me, and I gave an account of my first meeting with De Beauvais, without ever dreaming of the inferences it led to.

“An unhappy rencontre,” said the advocate, as if musing; “better have finished the intimacy, as you first intended, at the Bois de Boulogne.”

“It may be as you say, sir,” said I, irritated by the flippancy of his remark; “but perhaps I may ask the name of the gentleman who takes such interest in my affairs, and by what right he meddles in them?”

The general started back in his chair, and was about to speak, when the advocate laid his hand gently on his arm to restrain him, and, in a voice of the most unruffled smoothness, replied, —

“As to my name, sir, it is Laurence Baillot; my rank is simple avocat to the Cours et Tribunaux; and the ‘right’ by which I interfere in matters personal to you is the consideration of fifty louis which accompanied this brief.”

“And my name, young man, is Lieutenant-Général d’Auvergne,” said the old man, proudly, as he stared me steadfastly in the face.

I arose at once, and saluted the general with a deep and respectful obeisance. It was the same officer who reviewed us at the Polytechnique the day of my promotion.

“You are now, I hope, satisfied with the reasons of our presence, and that nothing but considerations of your interest can have influenced our visit,” said the avocat, with calmness. “Such being the case, sit down here, and relate all you can of your life since your leaving the Polytechnique. Be brief, too, for it is now three o’clock; the court opens at ten, your case will be called the second, and I must at least have three hours of sleep.”

The general pointed to a seat beside him; I sat down, and without any delay proceeded to give a rapid account of all my adventures and proceedings to the hour we were then assembled, only omitting all mention of Mademoiselle de Meudon’s name, and such allusions to De Beauvais as might lead to his crimination.

The advocate wrote down, as rapidly as I spoke them, the principal details of my history, and when I had concluded, perused the notes he had taken with a quick eye.

“This will never do,” said he, with more impatience in his manner than I had yet witnessed. “Here are a mass of circumstances all unexplained, and all suspicious. It is now entirely a question of the feeling of the court. The charges, if pressed, must lead to a conviction. Your innocence, sir, may satisfy – indeed, it has satisfied – General d’Auvergne, who else had not been here this night; but the proofs are not before us.”

He paused for a moment, and then continued in a lower tone, addressing himself directly to the general: “We must entreat a delay; a day – two days, certainly – will establish the proofs against George and his accomplices; they will be condemned and executed at once. It is most likely that the court will not recur to capital punishment again. The example being made, any further demonstration will be needless. I see you put little faith in this manoeuvre; but, trust me, I know the temper of the tribunal. Besides, the political stroke has already succeeded. Bonaparte has conquered all his enemies; his next step will be to profit by the victory.” These words were riddles to me at the time, though the day soon came when their meaning was palpable. “Yes, two days will do it,” said he, confidently raising his voice as he spoke; “and then, whether there be a hussar the more or one the less in France, will little trouble the current of events.”

“Then how to obtain the time, – that is the question,” said the general.

“Oh, we shall try something. There can always be a witness to be called; some evidence all-essential not forthcoming; some necessary proof not quite unravelled. What if we summoned this same Abbé? The court will make proclamation for him. D’Ervan is the name?”

“Yes; but if by so doing he may be involved – ”

“Fear nothing on that score; he’ll never turn up, believe me. We can affect to show that his evidence is all-important. Yes, we’ll make the Abbé, d’Ervan our first witness. Where shall we say he resides? Rouen, I suppose, will do; yes, Rouen.” And so, without waiting for a reply, he continued to write. “By this, you perceive,” he remarked, “we shall disconcert their plans. They are evidently keeping this abbe up for some greater occasion; they have a case against himself, perhaps, in which the proofs are not yet sufficient for conviction. We ‘ll trouble their game, and they may be glad to compromise with us.”

The general looked as much confounded as myself at these schemes of the lawyer, but we both were silent.

A few questions more followed, to which he wrote down my answers as I gave them, and then starting up, he said, —

“And now, General, I must hasten home to bed. Be ready, at all events, for appearing before the tribunal, Mr. Burke; at ten you will be called. And so, good-night.” He bowed formally to me, as he opened the door to permit the general to pass out first.

“I’ll follow you in a moment,” said the general, while he closed the door after him, and remained behind with me in the cell. “It was only this evening, sir,” said he, in a low voice, “at the return of Madame Bonaparte from Boulogne, that Mademoiselle de Meudon learned you were not at liberty. She has made me acquainted with the circumstances by which your present risk has been incurred, and has put me in possession of wherewithal to establish your innocence as regards the adventure at the château d’Ancre. This disclosure, if it exculpates you, will of course criminate her, and among those, too, where she has been received and admitted on terms of the closest friendship. The natural desire to save her cousin’s life will not cover the act by which so horrible a conspiracy might have escaped punishment. Bonaparte never forgives! Now, I am in possession of this proof; and if you demand it, it shall be in your keeping. I have no hesitation in saying that the other charges against you can easily be got over, this one being refuted. What do you say?”

“Nothing could make me accept of such an exculpation,” said I, resolutely; “and were it offered in spite of me, I ‘ll plead guilty to the whole act, and suffer with the rest.”

The old man’s eyes glistened with ‘pleasure, and I thought I saw a tear fall on his cheek.

“Now,” cried he, as he grasped my hand in both his – “now I feel that you are innocent, my brave boy, and, come what will, I ‘ll stand by you.”

With that he hurried from the cell, and followed the advocate, who was already calling with some impatience to have the doors unlocked.

I was again alone. No, not alone, for in my narrow cell hope was with me now.

CHAPTER XXXVII. THE TRIAL

So doubtful was the Government of the day in what way the people of Paris would be disposed to regard the trial of the Chouan prisoners, – how far public sympathy might side with misfortune and heroism, and in what way they would regard Moreau, whose career in arms so many had witnessed with pride and enthusiasm, – that for several days they did not dare to strike the decisive blow which was to establish their guilt, but advanced with slow and cautious steps, gradually accumulating a mass of small circumstances, on which the “Moniteur” each day commented, and the other journals of less authority expatiated, as if to prepare the public mind for further and more important revelations.

At last, however, the day arrived in which the mine was to be sprung. The secret police – whose information extended to all that went on in every class of the capital, and who knew the chitchat of the highest circles equally as they did the grumblings of the Faubourg St. Antoine – pronounced the time had come when the fatal stroke might no longer be withheld, and when the long-destined vengeance should descend on their devoted heads.

The want of energy on the part of the prosecution – the absence of important witnesses and of all direct evidence whatever – which marked the first four days of the trial, had infused a high hope and a strong sense of security into the prisoners’ hearts. The proofs which they so much dreaded, and of whose existence they well knew, were not forthcoming against them. The rumored treachery of some of their party began at length to lose its terror for them; while in the lax and careless proceedings of the Procureur-Général they saw, or fancied they saw, a desire on the part of Government to render the public uninterested spectators of the scene, and thus prepare the way for an acquittal, while no danger of any excitement existed.

Such was the state of matters at the close of the fourth day. A tiresome and desultory discussion on some merely legal question had occupied the court for several hours, and many of the spectators, wearied and tired out, had gone home disappointed in their expectations, and secretly resolving not to return the following day.

This was the moment for which the party in power had been waiting, – the interval of false security, as it would seem, when all danger was past, and no longer any apprehension existed. The sudden shock of the newly-discovered proofs would then come with peculiar force; while, mo matter how rapid any subsequent step might be, all charge of precipitancy or undue haste had been disproved by the tardy nature of the first four days’ proceedings.