“It is this stranger,” said they, “who has excited us against Raimond V.”
“This good and worthy noble who has always stood for us!”
“Yes, yes, that is so; he told us that Raimond wished to destroy our privileges, and, on the contrary, he respects them.”
“Without doubt, monseigneur did well in delivering him to the bulls of Camargne,” cried a sailor, shaking his fist at the recorder.
“Permit me, my friends,” said the recorder, painfully realising the absence of the consul, who had prudently escaped to the town hall, where he would appear as a plaintiff against the baron, “permit me to say that, although nothing could make me put faith in the baron’s good intentions, I do not hesitate to say that good may come out of all this. Perhaps my clerk has been mistaken; perhaps he has exaggerated the extent of the remarks made by the Baron des Anbiez. Come now, clerk,” said he, turning to the scribe with a severe and haughty air, “do not lie. Have you not deceived me? Recall your experience. Perhaps you were frightened into wrong. I know you are a coward. What did the baron say to you? Zounds! clerk, woe to you if you have deceived me, and if by your folly I, myself, have deceived these estimable citizens!”
Opening his large eyes to their utmost, and utterly confounded by the audacity of the recorder, the poor clerk could only repeat, in a trembling voice: “Monseigneur told me nothing; he made me sit down at his table, and every time I tried to tell him of the summons from the overseers Master Laramée came with a big glass of Spanish wine, that I was, to speak reverently, obliged to swallow at one draught.”
“Zounds!” cried the recorder, in a thundering voice. “What! this is the bad treatment you complained of! Forgive him, gentlemen, he was certainly drunk, and I am sorry to see that he has deceived us about the designs of Raimond V. Let us hasten to the town hall, where we can assure ourselves of the reality of certain facts, for the baron’s carriage has stopped there, I see.”
Thus speaking, and without appearing to hear the threatening murmurs of the crowd, the recorder hurried away, accompanied by the unfortunate clerk, who in the retreat received several thrusts, evidently addressed to Master Isnard.
The large audience-chamber of the town hall in La Ciotat formed a long parallelogram lighted by tall, narrow windows, with panes set in frames of lead.
On the walls opposite the windows—bare walls, white with a coating of lime—were displayed several flags captured from Barbary pirates.