In the Reign of Terror: The Adventures of a Westminster Boy

by G. A. Henty

When Harry had finished he strolled out. He saw that the task of getting an order for Marie's release would be more difficult than he had anticipated. He had hoped that by placing it with a batch of papers before Robespierre he would get him to sign it among others without reading it, but he now saw that this would be next to impossible. One thing afforded him grounds for satisfaction. Among the papers was a list of the prisoners to be brought up on the following day for trial. To this Robespierre added two names, and then signed it and sent it back to the prison. There was another list with the names of the prisoners to be executed on the following day, and this, Harry learned, was not sent in to the prison authorities until late in the evening, so that even they were ignorant until the last moment which of the prisoners were to be called for by the tumbrils next morning. Thus he would know when Marie was to go through the mockery of a trial, and would also know when her name was put on the fatal list for the guillotine. The first fact he might have been able to learn from his ally in the prison, but the second and most important he could not have obtained in any other way.

The work had been frequently interrupted by callers. Members of the Committee of Public Safety, leaders of the Jacobin and Cordeliers Clubs, and others, dropped in and asked Robespierre's advice, or discussed measures to be taken; and after a day or two Harry found that it was very seldom, except when taking his meals, that Robespierre was alone while in the house; and as his sister was in and out of the room all day, the idea of compelling him by force to sign the order, as they had originally intended to do with Marat, was clearly impracticable.

Each day after his work was over, and this was generally completed by about one o'clock, Harry called to see how Victor was getting on. He was gaining strength, but his brain appeared to make far less progress than his bodily health. He did not recognize Harry in the least, and although he would answer questions that were asked him, his mind appeared a blank as to the past, and he often lay for hours without speaking a word. After leaving him Harry met Louise and the two girls at a spot agreed upon the day before, a fresh meeting-place being arranged each day. He found it difficult to satisfy them, for indeed each day he became more and more doubtful as to his ability to get the order of release from Robespierre. Towards the man himself his feelings were of a mixed kind. He shuddered at the calmness with which, in his letters to the provincial committees, he advocated wholesale executions of prisoners. He wondered at the violence with which, in his shrill, high-pitched voice, he declaimed in favour of the most revolutionary measures. He admired the simplicity of his life, his affection for his sister and his birds, his kindness of heart in all matters in which politics were not concerned.

Among Robespierre's visitors during the next three weeks was Lebat, who was, Harry found, an important personage, being the representative on the Committee of Public Safety of the province of Burgundy, and one of the most extreme of the frequenters of the Jacobin Club. He did not recognize Harry, whom he had never noticed particularly on the occasion of his visits to the chateau, and who, in the somewhat threadbare black suit which he had assumed instead of the workman's blouse, wrote steadily at a table apart, taking apparently no notice of what was going on in the apartment.

But Harry's time was not altogether thrown away. It was his duty the first thing of a morning to open and sort the letters and lay them in piles upon the table used by Robespierre himself, and he managed every day to slip quietly into his pockets several of the letters of denunciation against persons as aristocrats in disguise or as being suspected of hostility to the Commune. When Robespierre left him to go to the Club or the Assembly Harry would write short notes of warning in a disguised hand to the persons named, and would, when he went out, leave these at their doors. Thus he had the satisfaction of saving a considerable number of persons from the clutches of the revolutionists. He would then, two or three days later, slip the letters of denunciation, very few of which were dated, among the rest of the correspondence, satisfied that when search was made the persons named would already have shifted their quarters and assumed some other disguise.

February had come and Harry was still working and waiting, busy for several hours each day writing and examining reports with Robespierre, striving of an evening to keep up the courage and spirits of the girls, calling in for a few minutes each day to see Victor, who, after passing through a long and terrible fever, now lay weak and apparently unconscious alike of the past and present, his mind completely gone; but the doctor told Harry that in this respect he did not think the case was hopeless.

"His strength seems to have absolutely deserted him," he said, "and his mind is a blank like that of a little child, but I by no means despair of his gradually recovering; and if he could hear the voice of the lady you tell me he is engaged to, it might strike a chord now lying dormant and set the brain at work again."

But as to Marie, Harry could do nothing. Do what he would, he could hit upon no plan whatever for getting her out of prison; and he could only wait until some change in the situation or the appearance of her name in the fatal list might afford some opportunity for action. It was evident to him that Lebat was not pushing matters forward, but that he preferred to wait and leave the horror of months in prison to work upon Marie's mind, and so break her down that she would be willing enough to purchase her life by a marriage with him.

There had been some little lull in the work of blood, for in December all eyes had been turned to the spectacle of the trial of the king. From the 10th of August he had remained a close prisoner in the Temple, watched and insulted by his ruffian guards, and passing the time in the midst of his family with a serenity of mind, a calmness, and tranquility which went far to redeem the blunders he had made during the preceding three years. The following is the account written by the princess royal in her journal of the manner in which the family passed their days: "My father rose at seven and said prayers till eight; then dressing himself he was with my brother till nine, when he came to breakfast with my mother. After breakfast my father gave us lessons till eleven o'clock; and then my brother played till midday, when we went to walk together, whatever the weather was, because at that hour they relieved guard and wished to see us to be sure of our presence. Our walk was continued till two o'clock, when we dined. After dinner my father and mother played at backgammon, or rather pretended to play, in order to have an opportunity of talking together for a short time.

"At four o'clock my mother went up stairs with us, because the king then usually took a nap. At six o'clock my brother went down, and my father gave us lessons till supper at nine. After supper my mother soon went to bed. We then went up stairs, and the king went to bed at eleven. My mother worked much at tapestry and made me study, and frequently read alone. My aunt said prayers and read the service; she also read many religious books, usually aloud."