The Elusive Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy (books to read to improve english txt) 📕

arms as they marched out of the gate.

In the midst of them walked a slight, dark figure, clad entirely in black, save for the tricolour scarf round his waist.

The crowd of watchers gazed on the little party with suddenly awakened interest.

“Who is it?” whispered some of the men.

“The citizen-governor,” suggested one.

“The new public executioner,” ventured another.

“No! no!” quoth Pierre Maxime, the doyen of Boulogne fishermen, and a great authority on every matter public or private with the town; “no, no he is the man who has come down from Paris, the friend of Robespierre. He makes the laws now, the citizen-governor even must obey him. ’Tis he who made the law that if the woman up yonder should escape⁠ ⁠…”

“Hush!⁠ ⁠… sh!⁠ ⁠… sh!⁠ ⁠…” came in frightened accents from the crowd.

“Hush, Pierre Maxine!⁠ ⁠… the Citizen might hear thee,” whispered the man who stood closest to the old fisherman; “the Citizen might hear thee, and think that we rebelled.⁠ ⁠…”

“What are these people doing here?” queried Chauvelin as he passed out into the street.

“They are watching the prison, Citizen,” replied the sentinel, whom he had thus addressed, “lest the female prisoner should attempt to escape.”

With a satisfied smile, Chauvelin turned toward the Town Hall, closely surrounded by his escort. The crowd watched him and the soldiers as they quickly disappeared in the gloom, then they resumed the stolid, wearisome vigil of the night.

The old Beffroi now tolled the midnight hour, the one solitary light in the old Fort was extinguished, and after that the frowning pile remained dark and still.

XXIX The National Fête

“Citizens of Boulogne, awake!”

They had not slept, only some of them had fallen into drowsy somnolence, heavy and nerve-racking, worse indeed than any wakefulness.

Within the houses, the women too had kept the tedious vigil, listening for every sound, dreading every bit of news, which the wind might waft in through the small, open windows.

If one prisoner escaped, every family in Boulogne would be deprived of the breadwinner. Therefore the women wept, and tried to remember those Paters and Aves which the tyranny of liberty, fraternity and equality had ordered them to forget.

Broken rosaries were fetched out from neglected corners, and knees stiff with endless, thankless toil were bent once more in prayer.

“Oh God! Good God! Do not allow that woman to flee!”

“Holy Virgin! Mother of God! Make that she should not escape!”

Some of the women went out in the early dawn to take hot soup and coffee to their men who were watching outside the prison.

“Has anything been seen?”

“Have ye seen the woman?”

“Which room is she in?”

“Why won’t they let us see her?”

“Are you sure she hath not already escaped?”

Questions and surmises went round in muffled whispers as the steaming cans were passed round. No one had a definite answer to give, although Désiré Melun declared that he had, once during the night, caught sight of a woman’s face at one of the windows above: but as he could not describe the woman’s face, nor locate with any degree of precision the particular window at which she was supposed to have appeared, it was unanimously decided that Désiré must have been dreaming.

“Citizens of Boulogne, awake!”

The cry came first from the Town Hall, and therefore from behind the crowd of men and women, whose faces had been so resolutely set for all these past hours towards the Gayole prison.

They were all awake! but too tired and cramped to move as yet, and to turn in the direction whence arose that cry.

“Citizens of Boulogne, awake!”

It was just the voice of Auguste Moleux, the town-crier of Boulogne, who, bell in hand, was trudging his way along the Rue Daumont, closely followed by two fellows of the municipal guard.

Auguste was in the very midst of the sullen crowd, before the men even troubled about his presence here, but now with many a vigorous “Allons donc!” and “Voyez-moi ça, fais donc place, voyons!” he elbowed his way through the throng.

He was neither tired nor cramped; he served the Republic in comfort and ease, and had slept soundly on his paillasse in the little garret allotted to him in the Town Hall.

The crowd parted in silence to allow him to pass. Auguste was lean and powerful, the scanty and meagre food doled out to him by a paternal government had increased his muscular strength whilst reducing his fat. He had very hard elbows, and soon he managed, by dint of pushing and cursing to reach the gateway of Gayole.

“Voyons! enlevez-moi ça,” he commanded in stentorian tones, pointing to the proclamation.

The fellows of the municipal guard fell to and tore the parchment away from the door whilst the crowd looked on with stupid amazement.

What did it all mean?

Then Auguste Moleux turned and faced the men.

“Mes enfants,” he said, “my little cabbages! wake up! the government of the Republic has decreed that today is to be a day of gaiety and public rejoicings!”

“Gaiety?⁠ ⁠… Public rejoicings forsooth, when the breadwinner of every family⁠ ⁠…”

“Hush! Hush! Be silent, all of you,” quoth Auguste impatiently, “you do not understand!⁠ ⁠… All that is at an end⁠ ⁠… There is no fear that the woman shall escape.⁠ ⁠… You are all to dance and rejoice.⁠ ⁠… The Scarlet Pimpernel has been captured in Boulogne, last night⁠ ⁠…”

“Qui ça the Scarlet Pimpernel?”

“Mais! ’tis that mysterious English adventurer who rescued people from the guillotine!”

“A hero? quoi?”

“No! no! only an English spy, a friend of aristocrats⁠ ⁠… he would have cared nothing for the breadwinners of Boulogne⁠ ⁠…”

“He would not have raised a finger to save them.”

“Who knows?” sighed a feminine voice, “perhaps he came to Boulogne to help them.”

“And he has been caught anyway,” concluded Auguste Moleux sententiously, “and, my little cabbages, remember this, that so great is the pleasure of the all-powerful Committee of Public Safety at this capture, that because he has been caught in Boulogne, therefore Boulogne is to be specially rewarded!”

“Holy Virgin, who’d have thought it?”

“Sh⁠ ⁠… Jeanette, dost not know that