Читать книгу The Greatest Historical Novels - Рафаэль Сабатини - Страница 73

Table of Contents

The Citizen-Representative François Chabot strutted into his sordid lodgings in the Rue Saint-Honoré with the sense of being by much a greater man than when he had left it that morning to repair to the Convention. He felt, indeed, like some lesser Atlas bearing the French Nation upon his shoulders.

Godlike and truculent, he came into those shabby two rooms and the presence of Julie Berger. The one and the other offended him. Here was an incongruous Olympus, an incongruous goddess. He spurned her fawning greeting and stamped into the middle of the sordid room to survey it with the eyes of scorn.

'May God damn me,' was precisely what he said ('Que Dieu me damne'), 'if I will support this longer.'

'What offends you, my cherished one?' quoth the cross-eyed in conciliatory accents. Although a scold by nature, here instinct warned her scolding would be out of season.

'What offends me? To the devil with it all, I say!' His left hand on his hip, his head thrown back, he made a sweeping comprehensive gesture with his free right arm. 'To the devil with it all! And to the devil with you! Do you know who I am? François Chabot, Deputy for Loir-et-Cher in the National Convention, the wonder of the intellectuals, the idol of the people, the greatest man in France at this moment. And you ask me who I am!'

'I did not ask you, my love,' she protested mildly, perceiving that his attack of egomania was unusually violent, and perceiving also that he was not quite sober. 'I know who you are. I know what a great man you are. Do I not know it?'

'Oh, you do?' He eyed the ponderous, sagging body, so shabby in its faded black, the pallid face that was robbed of comeliness by its squint; he became conscious of the grime upon it, of the horrid, ill-kempt condition of the brown hair, wisps of which thrust untidily from her capacious mob-cap. There was almost dislike of her in that glance of his. 'Then, if you know it, how can you suffer that I should continue in these surroundings? Is this a dwelling for a representative of the sacred people! These broken shards, this common furniture, this filthy, uncarpeted floor! All this detracts from the dignity of my office. I owe it to myself and to the people whom I represent to house myself in dignity.'

She tittered venomously. 'Why, so you do, my friend. But dignity costs money.'

'Money? What is money?'

'Filth, so you say. But it's useful filth. It brings the things you lack and I lack. What is the use of being a great man? What's the use of having people run after you in the street, point you out to one another, and shout, "Long Live Chabot"? What's the use of all this, my cherished one, when we have no money, when we live like pigs in a sty?'

'Who says I have no money?' He snorted furiously. 'Money! I have all the money a man desires. It is at my command. I have but to put forth my hand and take it.'

'In the name of God, then, put forth your hand. Let me behold this miracle.'

'It is done. Mine is the purse of Fortunatus, the hand of Midas.'

'Whose purse?' quoth she, wondering had madness this time gone too far for recovery.

He paced the chamber, his chin in the air, his gestures like those of an actor at the Théâtre Français. He talked volubly, boasted freely. He owned a fleet in the Mediterranean; the resources of the bank of the brothers Frey were at his command. He must be better housed than this, better clothed, better ... He broke off. He had been about to say better accompanied, but a timely remembrance of her potentialities in venom checked him.

Yet, although he did not utter the word, she sensed it, and her smile changed. It grew bitter and cunning. She sat down to observe him. Then she uttered words that administered a cold douche to his exaltation, and brought him to a panic-stricken halt.

'So the Freys have bribed you, eh? They've paid you well to get a repeal of the decree against their corsairs. Behold your fleet, my friend.'

His eyes stood forward on his face. He made a noise like the inarticulate growl of a beast. For a moment she cowered in terror, believing that he was about to leap upon her. This, indeed, was his impulse: to strangle that vile throat of hers so that never again should it utter such a blasphemy. But prudence mastered rage. How much did this woman know?

'What's that you say, Jezebel?'

'What I know.' She laughed at him, perceiving herself safe again. 'What I know. Do you suppose that I can't read because I am cross-eyed, or do you suppose my education was neglected?'

'Read? What have you read?'

'The speech that was written for you by somebody; the Freys belike. Ha, ha! You'd like the people to know that, wouldn't you? That those foreign Jews put words into your mouth so that you may seduce the representatives and the people; and that they pay you for the dirty job. A patriot, you! You! The greatest man in France, the wonder of the intellectuals, the idol of the people! You!' The scold's nature had come uppermost. Malice poured from her in a foul torrent of mockery.

'Silence, harridan!' He was livid. But she saw that he was no longer dangerous. Pusillanimous she knew him, this woman from whom he had no secrets, and she saw how fear was sobering and subduing him.

'I'll not be silent! Not I. Why should I be silent?'

'Because if I have more of this, I'll fling you back into the street from which I took you.'

'So that I may tell the people how you sold yourself to the Austrian Jews?'

He eyed her with formidable dislike. 'Putaine!' With that vile word he swung aside and went to sit down. He was suddenly limp. He had nursed a snake in his bosom. This woman might have the will, as she had the power, to ruin him. He must temporize, conciliate. Threats could not avail him against one who held all the weapons.

Meanwhile she raged on. That foul name contemptuously flung had acted as a goad. Her strident voice—the voice with which Nature seems ever to endow the shrew—shrilled up. It floated out through the open windows, and could be heard in the street below. Neighbours paused to listen, smiled and shrugged. The Citizen-Representative Chabot was at one of his love-scenes with his borgnesse. He might rule a nation, but he would never rule that woman.

He strove to calm her. 'Quiet, my dear! In Heaven's name, a little calm! Sh! The neighbours will hear you! Listen, now, my dove! Listen! I supplicate, my little one!'

Not until she was out of breath, invective momentarily exhausted, did he really have an opportunity. He seized it, and talked rapidly. He reasoned. It was not at all as she supposed. He presented the case to her as the Freys and André-Louis had presented it to him. What he had done, he had done from a sense of duty. The rewards that came to him were rewards that he might take with an easy mind, and for which he could answer freely before the tribunal of his conscience.

She listened, sneering. Then, perceiving profit perhaps in accepting these explanations, she ceased to sneer. She demanded.

'I understand. I understand, my love. You are right. We should be better housed, better fed, better clad. Look at me. I am in tatters. Give me ten louis, that I may go and buy myself a gown to do you credit.' She rose and held out her hand.

'In a few days,' he answered readily, thankful that the storm had passed.

'Now,' she insisted. 'At once. Since you are rich, I will not go in rags a moment longer. Look at this gown. It goes to pieces if you pull it.'

'But I have no money yet. That is to come.'

'To come? When?'

'What do I know? In a few days, a few weeks, perhaps.'

'A few weeks!' She was shrill again. 'Why, what a fool you are, Chabot! In your place ...' She checked.

More cunning than Chabot in the minutiæ of life, she perceived what he had overlooked, the omission which in his place she would never have been so foolish as to have made. As it was she could correct it.

Two mornings later, she blossomed forth in a new gown, striped red and black, high-waisted as the fashion was, new shoes and stockings, and a new mob-cap under which her hair for once was tidily disposed. The Citizen-Representative opened his eyes, and demanded explanations. She tittered and was archly mysterious.

'We are not all of us such fools as you, Chabot. I am not one to go thirsty when there's a well within reach.'

That was all that she would tell him, and he went off perplexed, the mystery unsolved. Junius Frey could have solved it for him, and had thought of doing so. But upon further reflection the financier preferred to seek the Citizen Moreau and his friend de Batz, of whose judgment and ability he had by now been afforded such signal proof.

He found them at home when Tissot admitted them to their lodging in the Rue de Ménars. He made no attempt to minimize his uneasiness, which indeed scarcely needed expressing, for the signs of it were in his countenance. He rumbled forth a flood of lamentations in his deep, guttural voice. He announced that they were sold, betrayed. That puffed-up fool Chabot had allowed their secret to be discovered. His indiscretion had forged a sword which was being held over the head of Junius. He was being shamelessly blackmailed.

'Blackmailed!' It was André-Louis who stirred to that word, adducing the whole story from it. 'Let me know by whom. I have a short way with blackmailers.'

His grim confidence in himself was inspiring. Frey entered into explanations. Chabot had a housekeeper—this was the euphemism he employed to describe Julie—who was a traitress. She had discovered details of the business of the corsairs, and she had come to him yesterday to demand money.

'Did you give her any?'

'What else could I do? For the moment I have stopped her mouth with twenty louis.'

André-Louis shook his head. 'Not enough.'

'Not enough! Oh, my God! But I am then to give everything away? Chabot himself has had ...'

'No matter what Chabot has had. You should have given her two hundred. That would have compromised her. I would have done the rest for you.'

But de Batz joined issue with him. 'You can't deal with her as you dealt with Burlandeux. She is in possession of dangerous facts.'

André-Louis retired from the debate, and left it to de Batz and Junius. They concluded nothing. And this, after Junius had gone again, his panic undiminished, de Batz revealed to be precisely what he desired. He rubbed his hands and laughed.

'The thing is done, I think. Let the fair Julie precipitate the avalanche.'

But André-Louis was scornful! 'Is that your notion of an avalanche, Jean? Why, it's scarcely a snowball. Let Julie dare to throw it at the idol of the mob, and her head will pay for her temerity. I waste no thought on her. I have work to do this morning. I am to write an article for the Père Duchesne in praise of Chabot, for his labours of two days ago.' He smiled grimly. 'The higher we hoist him, the heavier the crash when he comes down. And I have promised Hébert an article demanding the expropriation of all foreign property in France. That should be popular.'

You may still read both those articles, the one a pæan of praise, the other a bitter philippic, both couched in the flamboyant inflammatory jargon of that Age of Reason, and both bearing the signature 'Scaramouche,' a nom de guerre which he was already rendering famous.

De Batz, however, was dubious of the timeliness of the second article. He accounted it premature, and said so at length. 'It will definitely ruin the Freys, and we may still need them for our purposes.'

André-Louis laughed. 'It would ruin the Freys if it were not for Chabot. Chabot will be moved to protect them. Don't you see? That is the trap in which I hope to take him. Lebrun will help him. Both will be compromised, and the compromising of two such prominent conventionals should set up a fine stench for the people's nostrils.'

But de Batz was persuaded that Chabot would take fright, and leave the Freys to their fate. 'The fellow is a poltroon. You are forgetting that.'

'I am forgetting nothing. In the matter of money Chabot has tasted blood: the merest taste. But it has given him an appetite for more. He'll not allow the source of it to be cut off without a struggle. Leave this to me, Jean. I see very clearly where I am going.'

De Batz, however, for all his faith in his remorselessly shrewd and energetic associate, was not reassured. He brooded over the matter. With brooding his persuasion grew that it would require stronger bonds than those now binding Chabot to the Freys before the conventional could be moved to take the risk of defending the brothers from the proposed decree of expropriation. Here was a problem for his ready wits. The thought of Julie Berger intruded upon his brooding, and suddenly he was inspired. The inspiration took him forthwith to the Rue d'Anjou.

The brothers received the Baron in the green-and-white salon, over whose elegancies presided an austere bust of Brutus set upon a tall marble-topped console. Conceiving his visit to be concerned with this distressing business of the Berger, they enlarged upon it at once.

'Be easy,' the Baron confidently reassured them. 'What she can do at present is less than nothing. She holds no proof. A man in Chabot's position is not to be destroyed by an unsupported denunciation. It would recoil upon the head that utters it. If Julie were to commit this indiscretion, fling this handful of mud at the popular idol, she would get herself torn to pieces for her pains. Make that clear to her next time she seeks you, and send her packing.'

Thus he elaborated the opinion conveyed to him in a half-dozen words by André-Louis.

The Freys considered the point of view, and were partially pacified. But only in so far as the past was concerned.

'This time it may be so,' said Junius. 'But there will always be danger so long as that evil-disposed woman is about. She may surprise other secrets. Chabot is not discreet. He drinks too much, and when he's drunk he's given to boasting. Sooner or later she may be in a position to ruin him, and, what is worse—oh, I am frank with you, citizen—she will be in a position to ruin those who are associated with him.'

'She must be eliminated,' said the Baron, so grimly that it startled them.

Emmanuel shivered and breathed noisily. Junius stared. 'How?'

'That's to be discovered. But discovered it must be. It is more important even than you yet realize. For very soon you may be needing Chabot's support as you have never yet needed it.'

That shook them afresh. Scared interrogation was in the eyes of both. De Batz flung his bombshell.

'It has just come to my knowledge that there is a movement on foot to demand that confiscation be decreed of the property of all foreigners resident in France.'

This was terrifying. Emmanuel, in a long shabby coat that added to his overgrown appearance, stood paralyzed, with fallen jaw. Junius, on the other hand, mixed rage with his panic. He turned purple and grew voluble. Such a thing would be an outrage. It was against the comity of nations. It must be the work of madmen. The Convention would never yield to any such demands.

'The Convention!' In utter frankness de Batz permitted himself to be scornful. 'Are you still under the delusion that the Convention governs France? It may do. But the mob governs the Convention. Vox populi, vox Dei, my dear Junius. That is the watchword of the Republic. The mob, directed by the Jacobins and the Cordeliers, is the real master. Hébert is to print an article demanding this expropriation. The demand will be so popular that the Convention will be powerless to resist it even if it has the will to do so.'

Emmanuel found his quavering voice to demand the source of the Baron's information.

'That is not important. Accept my word for it that the article is already written. Within a few days it will be printed and read. Within a few days again you will see the decree promulgated. That is inevitable.'

Junius accepted conviction. 'I suppose that sooner or later it was inevitable in such a country as this, with a people such as this.' He was bitter about the land of his adoption, this land which was being swept by the exhilarating and purifying winds of Liberty.

His conviction shattered Emmanuel's last hopeful doubt. His weak eyes looked tearfully at his sturdy brother.

'Oh, my God! Oh, my God! This is ruin! Ruin! The end of everything!'

De Batz agreed with him. 'It is certainly grave.'

Junius let his anger run free. Furiously he held forth upon his patriotic sentiments, his republicanism, his services to, and his sacrifices in, the holy cause of Liberty. He dwelt upon the friendships he had formed in the Jacobins and the Convention, spoke of the national representatives who had been free of his table and who had enjoyed even to the point of abuse the hospitality which he dispensed to all true patriots. It was unthinkable that he should be so ill-requited.

'It's an ungrateful world,' de Batz reminded him. 'Fortunately I am able to warn you in time.'

'In time? In time for what? You mock me, I think. What measures can I take?'

'You have a stout friend in Chabot.'

'Chabot! That poltroon!' Wrath was rendering Junius illuminatingly frank.

'He served you well in the matter of the corsair fleet.'

'He had to be driven to it, simple as it was. How should we drive him now, and if the decree is passed what can he do? Even he?'

'True, he would be powerless, then. You must act before the decree is promulgated.'

'Act!' Junius strode wildly about the room on his sturdy legs. 'How can I act? What is in your mind, Citizen de Batz?'

'Make his interests one with your own, so that he rises or falls with you. Oh, a moment. I have given this matter thought, for naturally it interests me, too. If you sink, my friend Moreau and I will suffer heavily in our investments with you. This is no time for half-measures, unless you are prepared to see all your wealth absorbed into the national treasury, and yourselves cast naked upon the world. Chabot can save you if you can arouse in him the courage and the will to do so.'

'Heiliger Gott! Tell me how it is to be done. How? There's the difficulty.'

'No difficulty at all. Bind Chabot to you in bonds that will make your cause his own, and so compel him for his own sake to champion it.'

'Where am I to find such bonds?' demanded Junius at the height of exasperation.

'In God's name where?' cried Emmanuel, wagging his narrow head.

'They are under your hand. The only question is, Will you care to employ them?'

'That would not be the question. I should like to know what bonds I possess that I would not employ in such an extremity.'

De Batz tapped his snuffbox and proffered it. Junius swept the courtesy aside by an impatient gesture; Emmanuel declined by a gentle shrinking. They were breathing hard in their impatience. But the Gascon was not to be hurried. Between poised finger and thumb, delicately, he held the pinch.

'Chabot is fortunately unmarried. You have an eminently marriageable and very attractive sister. Have you not observed that Chabot is susceptible to the attraction? This may offer a means to save your fortune.'

Smiling quietly upon their stupefaction, he snapped down the lid of his snuffbox with the thumb of one hand, whilst with the other he bore the pinch to his nostrils.

Junius, his feet planted wide, his dark brows knit, stood glowering at him in silence. It was Emmanuel who first found his voice.

'Not that! Not little Léopoldine! Ah, that ... that is too much! Too much!'

But de Batz paid no heed to him. He knew that decision lay with the elder brother, and that no merely emotional explosions from Emmanuel would influence it. He dusted some fragments of snuff from his cravat, and waited.

At last Junius growled a question. 'Is Chabot in this? Have you discussed it with him?'

De Batz shook his head. 'He is not even aware that the decree is to be demanded. And he should be kept in ignorance until you have him fast. That is why it is necessary to act quickly.'

'Why should you suppose that he will agree?'

'I have seen the way he looks at your sister.'

'The way he looks at her! That satyr! It's the way he looks at every woman. The result of a monastic education.'

'But Léopoldine!' Emmanuel was complaining. 'You could not contemplate it, Junius.'

'Of course not. Besides, what could it avail us in the end? And we do not even know that Chabot desires a wife.'

'The desire might be quickened.' De Batz sat back in his chair, crossing his legs. 'A dowry might determine the matter. It need not be exorbitant. Chabot's views of money are still comparatively modest. Say a couple of hundred thousand francs.'

Junius exploded. His visitor must suppose that his supplies were inexhaustible. He had to pay here and pay there and pay everywhere. He could not move without paying. He was growing tired of it.

'If you let things take their course, you'll have no more troubles of that kind,' said the sardonic de Batz. 'After all, you must one day be marrying your sister; and you will have to provide her with a dowry. Could you possibly marry her to greater advantage than to one who is already almost the first man in France and may soon stand firmly in that position! Think of your republican sentiments, my friend.'

Suspecting mockery, Junius eyed him not without malevolence.

'But Chabot!' Emmanuel was bleating in horror. 'Chabot!'

'Bah!' said Junius at length. 'What, after all, can the marriage profit us? Shall we be foreigners any the less when it is made? Shall we be the less liable to these expropriations?'

De Batz smiled the smile of superior shrewdness. 'Evidently you have not perceived the possibilities. It might, indeed, be that the brothers-in-law of a representative of Chabot's consequence would never be regarded as foreigners; that no legislation against foreign property could be understood to include theirs. This may come to be the case. But I have something more solid and assured for you.'

'You will need to have, by Heaven!'

'Once your sister is married to Chabot, she, at least, will have ceased to be a foreigner. Marriage will bestow upon her the French nationality of her distinguished husband. Her funds will be in no danger of confiscation, whatever happens. Do you see how simple it becomes? You transfer to her—to her and Chabot—all your possessions, and that is the end of your difficulties.'

'The end of my difficulties!' Junius's deep voice went shrill in protest. 'You tell me that will be the end of my difficulties! I am to make over all my property to my sister, to my sister and her husband Chabot, and that makes me safe, does it? But at that rate, my friend, I might as well suffer confiscation.'

De Batz waved a hand to quiet him. 'You assume too much. The transfer I suggest need not amount to the surrender of a single franc. I have thought it out. In the marriage contract you enter into an engagement to pay Chabot's wife over a term of years certain sums which in the aggregate will amount to your total present possessions. Don't interrupt me, or we shall never be done. Such an engagement, absorbing all you possess, will leave nothing available for confiscation.'

Junius could contain himself no longer. 'You substitute one form of confiscation by another. Fine advice, as God lives!'

'I do nothing of the kind. Observe my words more closely. I say that you enter into an engagement to pay. I did not say that you actually pay.'

'Oh! And the difference?'

'The engagement is of no effect. You engage to donate. Now a donation, under our existing laws, is valid only if formally accepted. Léopoldine being a minor has no legal power to accept. The donation must be accepted for her by a guardian or trustee. You will overlook this legal necessity; and you may rest assured that the omission will never be noticed. Whilst, then, leaving the donation without validity, so that neither Chabot nor your sister could ever claim fulfilment, it will, nevertheless, create the appearances necessary to place your fortune beyond the reach of confiscation. That, my good friends, is the way to save it. And it is the only way.'

It was indeed, as Junius at last perceived. A guttural German oath was his intimation that the light of this revelation had momentarily dazzled him.

'Oh, but Léopoldine! My little Léopoldine!' Emmanuel was quavering in tearful protest.

Savagely Junius turned upon him. 'Don't distract me with your bleating!' He took a turn in the room, and came to halt with his shoulders to the overmantel and the clock of Sèvres biscuit. The earlier gloom had passed from his face. There was a lively keenness in his dark eyes. Thoughtfully he stroked his long, pendulous nose. 'It is the way. Undoubtedly it is the way,' he muttered. 'Oh, but one cannot hesitate to take it, provided that Chabot ...'

'I will answer for Chabot. The prospect of so much wealth will bring him to your will. Be sure of that. If more is necessary, remind him that the looseness of his frequent amours is putting a weapon into the hands of his enemies. The day of aristocratic vice is overpast. The people demands purity of life in its representatives. He must not lie exposed to scandal. It is time he sought refuge from it in matrimony. That is the second argument. The third is Léopoldine herself.'

Junius nodded his big head. Emmanuel regarded him in distress, without daring to protest again.