• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“And?” said Geneviève.

“And, if I do meet him … well, I’ll take him on.”

Supper was over. Geneviève declared it was time to go by herself getting up from the table. At that moment the clock chimed.

“Midnight,” said Morand coldly.

“Midnight!” cried Maurice. “Midnight already!”

“Now there’s an exclamation that makes me happy,” said Dixmer. “It proves you weren’t bored and gives me the hope we’ll see you again. This is the house of a good patriot that is now open to you, and I hope you’ll soon see, citizen, that it’s the house of a friend.”

Maurice bowed and turned to Geneviève:

“Does the citizeness also permit me to return?” he asked.

“I’ll do better than permit it, I beg you to come back and see us,” said Geneviève with real verve. “Adieu, citizen.” With that, she headed back to her quarters.

Maurice took his leave of all the guests, paying particular attention to Morand, who had pleased him greatly; he shook Dixmer’s hand and left, dazed, but a lot more happy than sad about the various events that had rocked his evening.

“Extremely annoying encounter!” said the young woman after Maurice had gone, bursting into tears in front of her husband, who had walked her to her room.

“Nonsense! Citizen Lindey, known patriot, secretary of a section, incorruptible, adored, popular, is, on the contrary, a most precious acquisition for a poor tanner housing contraband goods,” Dixmer smirked.

“Do you really think so, my friend?” Geneviève asked.

“I think it’s a patent of patriotism, a seal of absolution placed on our house. And I think that from tonight the Knight of Maison-Rouge himself would be safe here.”

With that, Dixmer planted a kiss on his wife’s forehead, with an affection far more paternal than conjugal, and left her in the little pavilion that was hers alone to rejoin the guests we’ve already met around his table in the main building, where he himself slept.

10

SIMON THE COBBLER

It was the beginning of the month of May. Lungs tired of taking in the freezing cold mists of winter expanded in the pure air and gentle rays of a mild, tonic sun as it shone down on the great black walls of the Temple.

At the inside wicket that cut the tower off from the gardens, the soldiers on duty laughed and smoked.

But despite the lovely day, despite the offer that was made to the prisoners to come down and take a stroll around the gardens, the three women refused: since the execution of her husband, the Queen kept obstinately to her room so she didn’t have to pass the door to the second-floor apartment the King had occupied. Whenever she chanced to take the air since that fatal episode of the twenty-first of January, it was at the top of the tower, where the crenellations had been blocked off with shutters.

The National Guards on duty, who had been notified that the three women were authorized to go outside, thus waited in vain all day for them to avail themselves of the privilege. Toward five o’clock a man came down from the tower and approached the sergeant in command of the post.

“Ah! It’s you, Tison, old boy!” said the sergeant, who appeared to be a particularly cheery National Guard.

“It’s me all right, citizen. Your friend upstairs, citizen municipal officer Maurice Lindey, asked me to give you this permit granted by the Council of the Temple to my daughter to come and pay her mother a short visit this evening.”

“And what do you mean by leaving the very moment your daughter’s about to arrive, you unnatural father?” said the sergeant.

“Ah! It certainly costs me to have to leave, citizen sergeant. Of course I’d hoped to see my poor girl, too—I haven’t seen her for two months—and give her a kiss and a cuddle—what you call it, gallantly—the way any father does his daughter. Don’t think I don’t! Might as well piss in the wind. Duty, blasted duty, forces me to leave. I have to go to the Commune and make my report. A hackney carriage is waiting for me at the door with a couple of gendarmes, right when my poor Héloïse is about to show.”

“You poor unfortunate