"Exert your dexterity to escape a scene on which you are to appear once more ere you leave it forever. Your dictatorial chair, if attained, will be only a step to the scaffold, through a rabble who will spit on you as on Egalité. You have treasure enough. I expect you with anxiety. We will enjoy a hearty laugh at the expense of a people as credulous as greedy of novelty."
He but little knows,
Who wrote this coward warning, what I am.
I love not life so well, nor hate mankind
So slightly as to fly this country now:
No, I will ride and rule the storm I have rais'd,
Or perish in its fury.
(Madame de Cabarus enters.)
Ha! a woman!
How entered you?
Lady.—Your civic guard were sleeping;
I pass'd unquestioned, and my fearful strait
Compels appeal to thee, great Robespierre!
Deny me not, and Heaven will grant thy prayer
In that dread hour when every mortal needs it.
Repulse me not, and heaven thus at the last
Will not repulse thee from eternal life.
I am the daughter of the unhappy Laurens,
Who hath but one day more to live on earth.
Oh, for the sake of all thou holdest dear,
(kneeling before him.)
Spare to his only child the misery
Of seeing perish thus her much lov'd sire.
His head is white with age—let it not fall
Beneath yon dreadful axe. Through sixty years
A peaceful and reproachless life he led.
Thy word can save him. Speak, oh speak that word,
For our Redeemer's sake redeem his life,
And child and father both shall bless thee ever.
Robes. (aside.) I know her now—the chosen of Tallien
How beautiful in tears! A noble dame
And worthy to be mine. 'Twould sting his heart
To lose his mistress ere I take his head;
If I would bribe her passions or her fears,
As well I trust I can, I must be speedy.
Those drunken guards—should any see her here,
Then what a tale to spread on Robespierre,
The chaste, the incorruptible, forsooth——
(coldly approaching her.)
Lady, I may not save your father's life—
Duty forbids—he holds back evidence
Which would convict Tallien; nay, do not kneel,
I cannot interfere.
Daughter.—Oh, say not so.
He is too peaceful for intrigues or plotters—
Too old, too helpless for their trust or aid.
Oh, for the filial love thou bearest thy sire,
Thy reverence for his years——
Robes.—If he were living
And spoke in thy behalf, it were in vain.
Daughter.—For the dear mother's sake who gave thee birth
And suffer'd agony that thou might'st live——
Robes.—Not if her voice could hail me from the tomb,
And plead in thy own words to save his life.