The Hunchback of Notre Dame - Victor Hugo [235]
“Friend,” replied the king, “you talk of battles. This is only a mutiny; and I will quell it with a single frown whenever it pleases me.”
The other answered indifferently,—
“That may be, Sire. In that case it will merely be because the people’s hour has not yet come.”
Guillaume Rym felt obliged to interfere:—
“Master Coppenole, you are speaking to a powerful king.”
“I know it,” gravely answered the hosier.
“Let him talk, friend Rym,” said the king. “I like such frankness. My father, Charles VII, said that Truth was sick. I, for my part, thought she had died, without a confessor. Master Coppenole has undeceived me.”
Then, laying his hand familiarly upon Coppenole’s shoulder, he added,—
“You were saying, Master Jacques—”
“I was saying, Sire, that perhaps you were right,—that the people’s hour had not yet come in this land.”
Louis XI looked searchingly at him:—
“And when will that hour come, sirrah?”
“You will hear it strike.”
“By what o‘clock, pray?”
Coppenole, with his homely, peaceful face, drew the king to the window.
“Listen, Sire! Here you have a donjon, a bell-tower, cannon, burghers, soldiers. When the bell rings, when the cannon growl, when the donjon falls with a crash, when burghers and soldiers shout and slay one another, then the hour will strike.”
The king’s face became dark and thoughtful. For an instant he stood silent; then he gently patted the thick donjon wall, as he might have caressed the flank of his favorite horse.
“Oh, no!” he said; “you will not crumble so easily, will you, my good Bastille?”18
Then, turning with an abrupt gesture to the daring Fleming,—
“Did you ever see a revolt, Master Jacques?”
“I made one,” said the hosier.
“And how,” said the king, “do you set to work to make a revolt?”
“Ah!” replied Coppenole, “it is not very difficult. There are a hundred ways of doing it. In the first place, discontent must be rife in the town; that is not an uncommon occurrence. And then you must consider the character of the inhabitants. The men of Ghent are always ready to rebel; they always love the prince’s son, never the prince. Well, I will suppose that one morning somebody comes into my shop and says: Friend Coppenole, this thing or that thing has happened,—the Lady of Flanders is resolved to maintain the Cabinet; the high provost has doubled the tax on vegetables or something else; whatever you please. I drop my work on the spot; I leave my shop, and I run out into the street, crying, ‘Storm and sack!’ There is always some empty hogshead lying about. I mount upon it, and I proclaim aloud, in the first words that come to me; all that distresses me; and when you belong to the people, Sire, there is always something to distress you. Then there is a gathering of the clans; there are shouts; the alarm bell rings; the people disarm the troops and arm themselves; the market-men join in; and so it goes on. And it will always be so, so long as there are nobles in the seigniories, burghers in the towns, and peasants in the country.”
“And against whom do you rebel in this way?” asked the king. “Against your provosts; against your liege-lords?”
“Sometimes; that depends on circumstances. Against the duke, too, at times.”
Louis XI reseated himself, and said with a smile,—
“Ah! here they have got no farther than the provosts.”
At this instant Olivier le Daim returned. He was followed by two pages carrying various articles of the king’s toilet; but what struck Louis XI was the fact that he was also accompanied by the provost of Paris and the captain of the watch, who seemed dismayed. The spiteful barber also looked dismayed, but was inwardly pleased. He was the first to speak:—
“Sire, I crave your pardon for the disastrous news I bring!”
The king turned so quickly that he tore the matting on the floor with the legs of his chair.
“What do you mean?”
“Sire,” replied Olivier le Daim,