TRIAL OF THE DESERTER
You can believe, Fritz, that I did not sleep much that night, notwithstanding my fatigue. The thought of the deserter tormented me. I knew that if he should be shot, Zeffen and Sorlé would be inconsolable; and I knew, too, that after three or four years the vile race would say: "Look at this Moses, with his large brown cloak, his cape turned down over the back of his neck, and his respectable look—well, during the blockade he caused the arrest of a poor deserter, who was shot: so much you can trust a Jew's appearance!"
They would have said this, undoubtedly; for the only consolation of villains is to make people think that everybody is like themselves.
And then how often should I reproach myself for this man's death, in times of misfortune or in my old age, when I should not have a minute's peace! How often should I have said that it was a judgment of the Lord, that it was on account of this deserter.
So I wanted to do immediately all that I could, and by six o'clock in the morning I was in my old shop in the market with my lantern, selecting epaulettes and my best clothes. I put them in a napkin and took them to Harmantier at daybreak.
The special council of war, which was called—I do not know why—the Ventose council, was to meet at nine o'clock. It was composed of a major, president, four captains, and two lieutenants. Monbrun, the captain of the foreign legion, was judge-advocate, and Brigadier Duphot recorder.
It was astonishing how the whole city knew about it beforehand, and that by seven o'clock the Nicaises, and Pigots, and Vinatiers, etc., had left their rickety quarters, and had already filled the whole mayoralty, the arch, the stairway, and the large room above, laughing, whistling, stamping, as if it were a bear-fight at Klein's inn, the "Ox."
You do not see things like that nowadays, thank God! men have become more gentle and humane. But after all these wars, a deserter met with less pity than a fox caught in a trap, or a wolf led by the muzzle.
As I saw all this, my courage failed; all my admiration for Burguet's talents could not keep me from thinking:
The man is lost! Who can save him, when this crowd has come on purpose to see him condemned to death, and led to the Glacière bastion?