"Do as I tell thee. Be still." She caught the boy to her, and fell into a chair, sobbing. The marquis called to the quaking majordomo: "Take those two candelabra. Set them at the foot of the staircase—the foot." The old servant obeyed without words. The marquis went by him. He seemed to have forgotten François, who glanced at Mme. Renée and followed the master of the house.
There had been a moment's lull outside. The double stairway swept down to a landing, and then in one noble descent to the great deserted hall, where the faded portraits of lord and lady looked down among armor and trophies of war and chase.
"Put those lights there—and there. Get two more—quick! Set them on the brackets below. One must see. Put out the lights in the drawing-room. What, you here yet, Master Thief? What the devil are you doing here? The deuce!" As he spoke they were standing together on the broad landing, before them the great stair which led down to the illuminated hall below. The marquis had meant to meet these people outside; he was quiet, cool, the master of many resources. Surprised at the suddenness of the outbreak, he still counted, with the courage of habit, on his personal influence and address. As the marquis spoke, the roar without broke forth anew. A shower of stones clattered on door and wall and window with sharp crash and tinkle of breaking glass. It was followed by an indescribable tumult—shouts, laughter, the shrill voices of women, a multitudinous appeal to fear, ominous, such as no man could hear unmoved. The animal we call a mob was there—the thing of moods, like a madman, now destructive, now as a brute brave, now timid as a house-fly.
They beat on the great doors, and of a sudden seemed to discover that the servants, in flying, had not secured them. The doors gave way, and those in front were hurled into the hall by the pressure of those behind. In an instant it was half full of peasants armed with all manner of rude weapons. A dozen had torches of sheep's wool wrapped about pitchforks and soaked with tar. Their red flames flared up, with columns above of thick smoke. There were women, lads. None had muskets. Some looked about them, curious. Those without shouted and pressed to get in; but this was no longer easy. A few of the boldest began to move up the lower steps of the great staircase. At the landing above, in partial obscurity, stood the marquis and François. On the next rise behind them were Mme. Renée and her boy, unnoticed, unwilling to be left alone. The stairway and all above it were darker than the red-lighted hall, where ravage was imminent. A man struck with a butcher's mallet a suit of armor. It rang with the blow, and fell with clang and rattle, hurting a boy, who screamed. The butcher leaped on the pedestal and yelled, waving one of the iron gauntlets. They who hesitated, leaderless, at the foot of the dark ascent turned at the sound of the tumbled past.
The marquis cried aloud, "Halt, there!"
Some mischievous lad outside cast a club at the side window of the hall, and the quartered arms of Ste. Luce, De Rohan, and their kin fell with sharp, jangling notes on the floor and on the heads of the crowd.
"Halt, I say!" The voice rang out of the gloom, strong and commanding. The marquis's sword was out. "Draw, my charming thief. Morituri te salutant!"
"What?" cried François—"what is that?"
"Nothing. We are about to die; that is all. Let us send some couriers to Hades. You should have gone away. Now you are about to die."
François drew his long rapier. He was strangely elated. "We are going to die, Toto." The dog barked furiously. "Keep back!" cried his master. Then he heard Pierre Despard's shrill voice cry out: "Surrender, Citizen Ste. Luce, or it will be worse for thee." The mob screamed: "Despard! Despard!" He was hustled forward, amid renewed shouts, cries, crash of falling vases, and jangling clatter of broken glass. The reluctant leader tried to keep near to the door. The mob was of other mind. He was thrust through the press to the foot of the stair, with cries of "Vive Despard! Vive Despard!" The people on the stair, fearing no resistance, were pushed up, shouting, "À bas les émigrés!"