This is the end of all order. A wild fear seizes the throng; and these men flee madly, despairingly, scattered as withered leaves are scattered by the power of the tempest.
CHAPTER XXIII
Chupin’s stupefying revelations and the thought that Martial, the heir of his name and dukedom, should degrade himself so low as to enter into a conspiracy with vulgar peasants, drove the Duc de Sairmeuse nearly wild.
But the Marquis de Courtornieu’s coolness restored the duke’s sang-froid.
He ran to the barracks, and in less than half an hour five hundred foot-soldiers and three hundred of the Montaignac chasseurs were under arms.
With these forces at his disposal it would have been easy enough to suppress this movement without the least bloodshed. It was only necessary to close the gates of the city. It was not with fowling-pieces and clubs that these poor peasants could force an entrance into a fortified town.
But such moderation did not suit a man of the duke’s violent temperament, a man who was ever longing for struggle and excitement, a man whose ambition prompted him to display his zeal.
He had ordered the gate of the citadel to be left open, and had concealed some of his soldiers behind the parapets of the outer fortifications.
He then stationed himself where he could command a view of the approach to the citadel, and deliberately chose his moment for giving the signal to fire.