The Death of Henri.
Many a time I had left the house in the Rue des Catonnes with a very doubtful chance of returning, but I had rarely gone out with such a pressing sense of danger as now. Pillot's sudden appearance, his strange story, and the memory of former deceptions wrought on my nerves, and I almost wished Raoul or John Humphreys was with me.
The rioters, too, now that the soldiers had departed, returned to the street in a very quarrelsome humour. They stood in groups talking angrily; and one brawny ruffian, yelling "Death to the Nobles!" struck at me with a pike. Happily my sword was free and I pinked his arm; still it would have gone hard with me but for Pillot, who procured us a passage by the use of some jargon well-known to these night-birds.
"Be cautious, monsieur," he said, "the mob is growing dangerous. The riot has not spread far, but to-morrow——!"
"Will the city rise?"
"Nothing can stop it, monsieur. These people are like wild animals. You can excite them to a certain pitch, but beyond that——"
"What is the grievance now?" I asked, and Pillot shrugged his shoulders.
"There are many things, monsieur, but at present the chief is hunger. The inhabitants of these quarters are half starved, and they want to know why. They will put the question very loudly in a day or two."
"Will they rise against the throne?"
"It all depends. A whim or a word will do it. Some one will cry 'Down with Condé!' and there is your revolution ready-made. The man who is starving does not stop to reason. The cry may be 'Down with the Nobles!'—no one knows as yet, and no one cares."