"I denounce thee for an enemy of the republic!" cried the showman. "Seize him! seize him!" Francois broke away, and, using his long arms, reached the entrance. There was no earnest desire to stop him. The doorkeeper caught him by the collar. He kicked as only a master of the savate knows how to kick, and, free of the grip, called to Toto, and plunged into a crowd which made no effort to recapture him. He moved with them, and soon turned to cross the river.
Midway on the bridge he came face to face with Despard. He was ragged and fleshless, the shadow of the well-fed Jacobin he had last seen in the château of Ste. Luce.
"Ciel!" exclaimed François, "thou art starved." He had no grudge against his old partner, but he fully appreciated the danger of this encounter.
He was comforted by the man's alarm. "Come," said François, and took him into a little drinking-shop. It was deserted at this time of day. He easily drew out all he desired to know. Mme. Renée was assuredly dead; and he who threw the gauntlet, the butcher, dead also; and three or more on the fatal stairway. Grégoire had punished the village severely; heads had fallen. Pierre's friend Robespierre had abandoned him, had even threatened him—Pierre! but he had escaped any worse fate. He was half famished; and would François help him? François ordered bread and cheese and wine. He would see what next to do. And what of the marquis? He had not appeared in the lists of the guillotined; but he might readily have died unnamed, and escaped François's notice.
"No," said Pierre, sadly; "he lives. Of course he lives. The devil cannot die. He got away from Grégoire. Who could keep that man? But for thee and the accursed commissioner, I should have had my revenge. We shall meet some day."
"Shall I find him for thee?"
"Dame! no. Let us go out. I am uneasy; I am afraid."
"But of what?"
"I do not know. I am afraid. I am accursed with fear. I am afraid as a man is in a dream. Somewhere else I shall cease to fear. Let us go." He was in a sweat of pure causeless terror, the anguish of an emotion the more terrible for its lack of reason. It was the inexplicable torment of one of the forms of growing insanity. François looked on, amazed and pitiful. The man's eyes wandered here and there; he got up, and sat down again, went to the door, looked about him, and came back. At last, as François began to consider how to be free of a dubious acquaintance, Pierre said drearily:
"Is it easy to die? I should like to die. If I were brave like thee, I should drown myself."