A blow fell on the door as he spoke, and he stepped towards it. But at that despair moved her, and she threw herself upon him, and for a moment wrestled with him. At last, with an effort he flung her off, and, brandishing his weapon in her face, kept her at bay. “You vixen!” he cried, savagely, retreating to the door, with a pale cheek and his eyes still on her, for he was an arrant coward. “You deserve to go to prison with him, you jade! I will have you in the stocks for this!”
She leaned against the wall where she had fallen, her white, despairing face seeming almost to shine in the darkness of the wretched room. Meanwhile the continuous murmur of men’s voices outside could now be heard, mingled with the ring of weapons; and the summons for admission was again and again repeated, as if those without had no mind to be kept waiting.
“Patience! patience! I am opening!” he cried. Still keeping his face to her, he unlocked the door and called on the men to enter. “He is in the straw, M. le Mayor!” he cried in a tone of triumph, his eyes still on his wife. “He will give you no trouble, I will answer for it! But first give me my five crowns, mayor. My five crowns!”
He still felt so much fear of his wife that he did not turn to see the men enter, and was taken by surprise when a voice at his elbow—a strange voice—said, “Five crowns, my friend? For what, may I ask?”
In his eagerness and excitement he suspected nothing, but thought only that the mayor had sent a deputy. “For what? For the Girondin!” he answered, rapidly. Then at last he turned and found that half-a-dozen men had entered, and that more were entering. To his astonishment, they were all strangers to him—men with stern, gloomy faces, and armed to the teeth. There was something so formidable in their appearance that his voice faltered as he added: “But where is the mayor, gentlemen? I do not see him.”
No one answered, but in silence the last of the men—there were eleven in all—entered and bolted the door behind him. Michel Tellier peered at them in the gloom with growing alarm. In return the tallest of the strangers, who had entered first and seemed to be in command, looked round keenly. At length this man spoke. “So you have a Girondin here, have you?” he said, 115 his voice curiously sweet and sonorous.
“I was to have five crowns for him,” Michel muttered dubiously.
“Oh! Pétion,” continued the spokesman to one of his companions, “can you kindle a light? It strikes me that we have hit upon a dark place.”