The president struck his hand on the table.
“It is not for me to bandy words with you. You were arrested when patrolling the Champs Elysées, at an hour when all respectable men are in bed.”
“If,” said Suleau, “at an hour when all respectable men are in bed, where was monsieur?”
“Enough!” cried Bonjour angrily. “You are accused of conspiring with these to resist the will of the people—by innuendo, by direct insult to the people’s representatives—finally, by banding yourself with others to inquire secretly into, that you might successfully out-manœuvre, the processes of the movement having forfeiture for its object.”
“I congratulate monsieur,” said Suleau irrelevantly, “upon his admirable manœuvring for election to the Ministership of Marines.”
The president scrambled to his feet with an oath. The room broke into ferment.
“I beg to inform monsieur,” cried the prisoner, raising his voice, “that I am in possession of a municipal pass to the chateau of the Thuilleries!”
“Yes, yes—and we!” cried the huddle of captives by the window.
With the very echo of their words there came tumult in the vestibule, a trample of feet, and the head of a frowzy deputation burst into the room. The young Royalist turned about and, folding his arms, quietly faced the inrush. A woman was to its front—she he had seen mount the rough tribune in the yard to denounce him. He saw her now marking him down with a triumphant fury in her eyes—a strange, beautiful creature—his own enigmatical Nemesis, it seemed.
“Citizen president,” she cried in a full bold voice, “while St Antoine awaits your decision St Antoine is paralysed. Its cannon yawn in the faubourg; its pikes stab only at the air. To clear the ground of these outposts—bah! here needs not the interminable civil processes. Mouchards all, arrested armed in a state of belligerency, they shall be subject to martial law. In the name of the national fraternity, that to-day shall be confirmed and cemented, I demand that these prisoners be handed over to the people.”