Indeed, when Louis Rennepont left La Rochelle towards the end of the previous month, not a thread of silver whitened his raven locks. Now they were streaked with broad bands of grey! He seemed to have aged ten years. Such a change must have been produced by some terrible and sudden emotion. Theresa's exclamation was followed by a mournful silence. All eyes were fixed upon Louis Rennepont with increasing anxiety. He answered his wife with a trembling voice:
"Yes, Theresa; yes, my friends; my hair turned grey in one night—the night before St. Bartholomew's day—the night of the 23d of this month of August, of this year, 1572!"
And still shuddering with terror, his chest convulsed with repressed sobs, the young man hid his face in his hands and muttered: "My God! My God!"
Presently the young man recovered sufficient composure to proceed.
"Do you all remember," he said, solemnly addressing the stupefied members of his family, "the infernal scheme of Catherine De Medici that our poor Anna Bell overheard during the Queen's conversation with Loyola's disciple Lefevre at the Abbey of St. Severin?"
"Great God!" cried Antonicq. "The scheme of massacring all the Protestants, disarmed by the peace?"
"The massacre, begun in Paris under my own eyes, during the night before St. Bartholomew," answered Louis Rennepont with an effort, "that massacre is proceeding at this very hour in almost all the large cities of France!"
"Oh!" exclaimed Captain Mirant. "In sight of such a stupendous crime one's head is seized with vertigo—one is not certain of himself—one asks himself whether he is awake, or dreams."
"By my sister's death! We are not dreaming!" ejaculated the Franc-Taupin. "Friends, if we look down at a stream running under our feet, it often happens that, for a moment, our head turns. That is what we are now experiencing. We see at our feet a torrent flowing, a torrent of blood—the blood of our brothers!"
"A curse upon my head," thundered the boilermaker Barbot, raising his clenched fist to the ceiling, "if the blood of the Catholics does not run, if not in torrents, at least drop by drop, before La Rochelle! Let them come and attack us!"