“I wish to know Camille des Moulins’ place,” said Théophraste, “because he was a friend of mine.”
“And mine also,” said Marceline, with a look towards Adolphe, which seemed to say, “Not as much as you, Adolphe.”
But Adolphe laughed and said Camille was not a Girondist, he was a Franciscan friar, a friend of Danton, a Septembrian.
Théophraste was vexed, and Marceline protested that if he had been anything of the sort Lucille would not have married him. Adolphe did not insist, but as they had by now reached the chamber of torture, he feigned condescendingly to be interested in the labels which adorned the drawers decorating the walls, “Hops,” “Cinnamon,” “Spice,” etc.
“Here is the room in question. They have transformed it into the doctor’s store-room.”
“It is just as well, perhaps,” said Théophraste, “but not so impressive.”
Adolphe and Marceline were of the same opinion. They were not at all impressed. Here was the famous torture chamber. They expected something else. They were disillusioned. Outside, when viewed from the court of the Sundial, the formidable aspect of those old feudal towers, the last vestige of the palace of the French monarchy, momentarily brought fear and awe to their minds. That prison had stood a thousand years, had known so many tragedies, death rattles, legendary miseries, hidden secrets. It seemed that one only had to step inside to find an inquisition court in some dark corner, damp and funereal. Here seemed to be all the tragedies of the history of Paris, as immortal as the very walls.
What a disillusion here in these towers with a little plaster and paint they had made the office of the Director of Records, the store-room of the prison doctor. One could carouse here where once the hangman held sway. One could laugh where only the cries of the tortured were heard.
Now there would have been nothing unusual about this visit to the Conciergerie but for a very extraordinary incident which occurred after the party had left the torture chamber. The incident was weird and inexplicable, and while I read M. Longuet’s own description of it, I confess I found it impossible to believe. Therefore I went to the Chief Warden, who had shown the party round the prison, and asked for his account of the incident.
He gave it to me in the following words:
Sir, the affair passed as usual, and the lady, the two gentlemen and I visited the kitchen of St. Louis, which is now used as a store-house for plaster. We proceeded towards the dungeon of Marie Antoinette, which is now the chapel. On the way I showed them the crucifix, before which she prayed before mounting the cart which is now in the Director’s room. I told the man with the green umbrella that we had been obliged to transfer the Queen’s arm-chair to the Director’s room, because the English visitors had carried away pieces from it as souvenirs. We had by this time arrived at the end of the Street of Paris-you know the street that leads from Paris to the Conciergerie. We passed through that frightfully dark passage, where we found the grating behind which they cut off the hair of the women before execution. You know that it is the very same grating. It is a passage where never a ray of sunlight penetrates. Marie Antoinette walked through that passage on the day of her death. It is there that the old Conciergerie stands just as it was hundreds of years ago.
I was describing the Street of Paris, when suddenly the man with the green umbrella cried out in a voice so unlike the previous voice, so strangely that the other gentleman and lady looked startled: “Zounds, it is the walk of the Straw Dealers.” He said it in a weird tone and his whole attitude was changed. He used the expression, zounds, twice. I told him he was mistaken, that the walk of the Straw Dealers is what we call to-day the Street of Paris. He answered me in the same strange voice: “Zounds, you cannot tell me that! I have lain there on that straw like the others!” I remarked to him, smilingly, although not without a feeling of fear, that no one had lain on that straw in the alley of the Straw Dealers for more than two hundred years.
He was just about to answer me when his wife intervened. “What are you saying, Théophraste?” said she. “Do you wish to teach Monsieur his business? You have never been to the Conciergerie before.” Then he said in his natural voice, the voice by which I had known him at first: “That is so, I have never been here before.”
I could not understand then at all, but thought the incident closed, when he did something stranger still.
We visited the Queen’s Dungeon, Robespierre’s Dungeon, the Chapel of the Girondists, and that little gate, which is still the same as when the unfortunate prisoners, called the Septembrians, leaped over it to be massacred in the court. We were now in the Street of Paris. There was a little stairway on the left which we did not descend. It led to the cellars which I did not deem necessary to show, as it was dark and difficult of access. The gate at the bottom of this staircase is closed by a grating which is perhaps a thousand years old-possibly more. The gentleman, whom they called Adolphe, proceeded with the lady toward the door leading out of the guard-room, but without saying a word the man with the green umbrella descended the little staircase. When he was at the grating he cried out in that strange, weird voice: “Well, where are you going? It is here.” The gentleman and the lady stopped as if petrified. The voice was terrible, and nothing in the outward appearance of the man would make you believe that the voice came from him. In spite of my fear I ran to the head of the stairs. I was thunderstruck. He ordered me to open the grating, and I don’t know how I obeyed him. It was as if I had been hypnotized. I obeyed mechanically. Then when the grating was opened he disappeared in the darkness of the cellar. Where had he gone? How could he find his way? Those subterranean passages of the Conciergerie are plunged in frightful darkness and nobody has been down there for centuries and centuries.
He had already gone too far for me to stop him. He had hypnotized me. I stayed about a quarter of an hour at the entrance of that dark hole. His companions were in the same state as I was. It was impossible to follow him. Then suddenly we heard his voice, not his first voice, but his second. I was so startled I had to cling to the grating for support. He cried out: “It is thou, Simon l’Anvergust.” I could not answer. He passed near me, and as he passed it seemed to me that he put a scrap of paper in his jacket pocket. He leaped up the steps with one bound and rejoined the lady and gentleman. He gave them no explanation. As for me, I ran to open the door of the prison for them. I wanted to get them outside. When the wicket was open and the man with the green umbrella was walking out, without apparent reason he said: “We must avoid the wheel.” I don’t know what he meant, as there was no carriage near.
CHAPTER II
An Explanation from Théophraste
NOW in reading the last chapter one would immediately think that M. Longuet had gone mad. What had possessed him? Where did he go? In order that you might fully understand his peculiar actions I will give you