CHAPTER IV

Gee up, Polignac!--André Marchais--Post-master at Bourget--I display the Tricolour on my carriage--Bard joins me--M. Cunin-Gridaine--Old Levasseur--Struggle with him--I blow out his brains!--Two old acquaintances--The terror of Jean-Louis--Our halt at Villers-Cotterets--Hutin--Supper with Paillet

By the time I reached Villette I could not put one leg before the other. But, by good luck, I caught sight of a trap.

"Driver," I said, "ten francs if you take me to Bourget!"

"Fifteen?"

"Ten!"

"Fifteen!"

"Nonsense!"

"Well, then, jump in, governor."

In I jumped, and we set off. The horse was a slow one, but the driver was a good patriot. When he knew how great a hurry I was in, and the object of my journey, he said--

"Oh! it's no wonder, then, that my horse will not trot any faster, for I christened him Polignac; he is an idle good-for-nothing that one can do nothing with.... But don't be anxious, we shall get there all right."

And he took hold of his whip by the lash end, struck the horse with the handle instead of the thong, and shouted, "Gee up, get along, Polignac!" By dint of shouting, swearing and lashing we reached Bourget in an hour's time. The wretched horse was at the last gasp, and I thought that, like his illustrious namesake, he had reached the end of his tether. I paid the ten francs agreed upon, and I nobly added two francs as a tip--then I went into the posting-house yard. The posting-master was just harnessing a horse to a trap. I went up to him, gave him my name, showed him the order from General Gérard and General La Fayette's proclamation, and asked him to provide me with the necessary means of fulfilling my mission.

"Monsieur Dumas," he said, "I was putting my horse in to go to Paris in search of information; but there will now be no need for me to go since you bring such excellent news. I will therefore put post-horses into the trap and take you as far as Mesnil; if you do not find a conveyance there, you can keep my trap, and on your return you will replace it in the coach-house."

No one could have spoken fairer. In the midst of our conversation, I heard myself called by name, and, as it was too soon for Bard to have arrived, I turned round to see who it was. It was André Marchais, one of our warmest and most disinterested patriots; he had posted from Brussels, where the news of the insurrection had only arrived the day before. He was miserable when he learned that it was all over. Selfish fellow! He hoped to get killed or wounded for the good cause.

We embraced heartily. I afterwards learnt that, when he reached Paris, he found a writ awaiting him, signed by the Duc de Raguse, in common with the same sent to General La Fayette, Laffitte and Audry de Puyraveau. While we were greeting one another, the horses were being put to my carriage and to Marchais's, and then Marchais' started for Paris.

"I am now at your service," said the posting-master, who seemed surprised I was not in a great hurry.

"Pardon," I replied. "I am waiting for a companion who is coming from Paris with my horse and pistols.... I am intending, if you will allow me, to leave my horse here in exchange for your trap."

"Leave whatever you like," was his reply.

We gazed down the road as far as we could see, but nothing was yet in sight.

"We shall have time," I said to the posting-master, "to rig up a tricolour flag."

"What for?" he asked.

"To put on your trap.... It will indicate our opinions, and will prevent our being arrested for fugitives."

"Oh! oh!" he said, laughing, "on the contrary, they are more likely to stop you, because ... you look like something quite different."

"Never mind, I shall be delighted to sail under the three colours."

"Ah! as far as that goes, that's easy enough!"

He crossed the street, went into a draper's shop, bought half a yard each of white, blue and red merino, got the people to sew the three half yards together, and nailed them to a broom handle. The flag was ready in ten minutes, and it cost twelve francs, broom stick included. We fastened it with two cords to the hood of the trap. As we were accomplishing this task we caught sight of Bard, who arrived on my horse at full gallop. I signed to him to hurry yet more if it were possible, but he could not go faster. At last he joined us.

"Ah!" he said, "I am glad to see that you have got a carriage, for I am dreadfully saddle sore!"

Then, as he stepped to the ground, he said, "There are your horse and pistols."

"You did not think to bring a shirt too?"

"Upon my word I didn't! I don't think you mentioned anything about a shirt."

"No, it is my own fault.... Hand the horse to the stable lad, take the pistols and be sharp and get in; it is five o'clock already!"

"A quarter to five," the post-master remarked, looking at his watch.

"Do you think we shall reach Soissons before eleven to-night?"

"It will be a difficult job--but there, so many miracles have happened the last three days that it would not be impossible for you to perform this one."

And he gave orders to the postillion to mount the horse.

"Are you on?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Then off you go; gallop the whole way, you understand?"

"I understand, governor," said the postillion.

And he set off at a furious pace.

"You know the pistols aren't loaded," Bard said.

"All right! we will load them at Villers-Cotterets."

By a quarter to six we were at Mesnil: we had covered nearly four leagues in the hour.

Luckily there were fresh horses at the post. Our postillion here got another postboy to take up the running, and, in order that we might make even better speed, they put in three horses this time instead of two. I wanted to pay for the stage we had just done, but the posting-master had given his orders and the postillion refused to take the money. I gave him ten francs for himself; he commended us to the fresh postboy and we set off at top speed. Fortunately, the trap was well-seasoned, and in an hour we were at Dammartin. Our tricolour flag produced the desired sensation. The people came out all along our route and made the liveliest signs of enthusiasm; and, by the time we reached our relay at Dammartin, half the town had collected round us.

"This is capital!" exclaimed Bard; "but to make things more lively still, we ought to shout something."

"Right you are, my friend, shout away; and, while you shout, I will take a little nap."

"What shall I shout?"

"Why, _Vive la République!_ to be sure!"

We came out of Dammartin amidst shouts of "_Vive la République!_"

Between Dammartin and Nanteuil we saw a post-carriage, which, when it caught sight of our tricolour flag, stopped, and its occupants stepped down.

"What news?" a man of about fifty asked us.

"The Louvre is taken and the Bourbons have fled; there is a Provisional Government composed of La Fayette, Gérard, etc. _Vive la République!_"

The gentleman of fifty scratched his ear and got into his carriage again. It was M. Cunin-Gridaine. We resumed our journey, and by twenty to eight we were at Nanteuil. We had only three hours and twenty minutes left and still had twelve leagues to go. It was not likely we could manage it, but my principle always is not to despair so long as there is any vestige of hope left; even then! ... At Nanteuil we again changed horses, and the tricoloured flag had its usual effect. Nothing was known of Paris doings, so we brought the first really definite news. They gave us an old postillion, to whom I shouted--

"Four leagues an hour, and three francs as tip."

"All right, all right," said the old fellow. "I know my business. I've driven _the general._"

The general was my father; for, you see, I was in my native country here.

"All right; if you have driven my father, you know he liked fast driving. I take after him."

"Right, I know my business."

"Off, then."

"We're off!"

"Oh!" said the postillion I was leaving behind, "I pity you, M. Dumas. You have a bad customer to deal with."

"I will make him go, never fear."

"I hope so. _Bon voyage!_ Come, off you go, Levasseur; put a little quicksilver in your boots!"

And the postillion departed.

"Levasseur," I shouted to him, "I told you three francs for yourself if we reach Levignan by half-past eight."

"If we don't get there by half-past eight we shall by nine. I know my business."

"You understand," I repeated, "I will be at Levignan by half-past eight."

"Bah! only kings say _I will._"

"There is no longer a king.... Come, come. Quicker, quicker!"

"Let us climb the rise first, and then we will see about that."

So we climbed the rise, and then old Levasseur put his horses to the trot.

"Oh! Levasseur, this won't do at all," I said.

"How, then, do you want me to go?"

"Faster."

"Faster? It is forbidden."

"Forbidden by whom?"

"By the rules, deuce take it! I know my business, you bet!" "Look here, Levasseur ..."

"What is it?"

"Let me get down."

"Ooh!... ooh!"

The carriage stopped; I got out, and I cut a branch from an elm by the roadside.

"Look here," he said, looking on with great uneasiness, "you are not cutting off that switch to whip my horses with, I hope?"

"Make yourself easy on that score, Levasseur," I said, as I got back into the carriage. "Go on!"

"It is all very well to say go on; but have you cut that stick to beat my horses with is what I want to know?"

"All right, we shall see about that."

"Oh! we shall see about that, shall we? I'm not afraid of you because you have a gun."

"Look here, Levasseur, you know your business as a postillion, don't you?"

"Rather."

"Well, then, I too know mine as a traveller.... Your notion, it would seem, is to go as slowly as possible, while mine is to go as fast as I can. We will see which of us is the stronger."

"We will see whatever you like, I don't care."

I drew out my watch. "You have two minutes in which to make up your mind."

"What to do?"

"To put your horses to the gallop."

"And if I won't?"

"If not, I shall do so myself."

"You mean it?"

"Certainly!"

"Well, I shall like to see the fun."

"You shall, Levasseur, take my word for it."

He began to strike up the lament of Saint Roch. While all this was taking place we had been going at a slow trot.

"Look here, Levasseur," I said, at the end of the first couplet, "I warn you that one minute has gone already."

Levasseur began intoning the second at the top of his voice; but just as he was going to begin the third I gave his horses a sound whack across their quarters with the stick. They made a leap forward and set off at full trot.

"Now, now, what are you doing?" asked the postillion.

Instead of replying, I redoubled my blows and thrashed the horses into a gallop.

"Oh! curse it, curse it, is that what you mean? Let me get down for a second and you shall see, indeed! Ah! you will have to settle with me. Wo! wo! Good heavens, will you stop it?"

"What! stop it, Levasseur?" I shouted, continuing to beat with all the strength in my arms, "when I tell you that I know my business better than you know yours!"

"Once more, will you have done?... No?... Wo! wo! wo!"

It was in vain he cried "Wo!" or reined in his horses; they reared, but galloped all the same. Unluckily, my elm branch broke and I was disarmed. But the horses were so well started that he did not manage to pull them up for a hundred yards.

"Ah! Good heavens! Confound it all!" he shouted. "When I have stopped my horses you shall answer for this, I can tell you!"

"Now, what do you intend to do, Levasseur?" I asked, laughing.

"To unharness them, and leave you and your trap in the middle of the road.... We shall see if it is allowable to put the poor beasts into such a state."

And by degrees he calmed his horses down.

"Hand me one of my pistols," I said to Bard.

"What for?"

"Pass it, quick."

"You aren't going to blow his brains out?"

"I am, indeed!"

"They are not loaded."

"I am going to load them."

Bard gazed at me in terror.

I put a percussion cap on each nipple and rammed a wad down the centre of each barrel. I had just finished the operation when the carriage pulled up, and the postillion got down, swearing, to unfasten the traces, as he had threatened, lifting up his legs one after the other heavily in their great boots. I waited for him, pistol in hand.

"Look here, Levasseur," I said, "if you touch those traces I shall smash your head for you."

He raised his eyes and saw the two muzzles of the pistol.

"Stuff!" he said, "you daren't kill people that fashion!" And he put his hands to the traces.

"Levasseur, take care what you are doing! Do you mean to take out the horses?"

"The horses are mine, and, when they are over-driven, I unharness them."

"Have you a wife and children?"

Again he looked up; the question struck him as an unusual one.

"Yes, I have a wife and four children--a boy and three girls."

"Well, then, Levasseur, let me warn you that, if you do not let the traces alone, the Republic will be obliged to grant a pension to your family."

He began to laugh and to grip the traces with both hands. I pressed the trigger, the cap exploded and the wad hit my man in the middle of his face. He believed he was killed and fell backwards, his face between his hands, half fainting. Before he had recovered from the shock and astonishment I had drawn off his boots, as Tom Thumb drew off the Ogre's, put them on my own legs, jumped astride the saddle-horse, and we set off at full gallop. Bard nearly fell into the floor of the carriage with laughing. When we had gone three or four hundred yards, I turned round, though I still kept on whipping the horses, and I saw old Levasseur had sat up and begun to collect his senses. A tiny hill we were ascending soon hid him from my sight. I had still nearly a league and a half to make, but I caught up the lost time and did it in seventeen minutes. I reached the post at Levignan with a grand flourish of whips, and, when I pulled the horses up, two persons appeared on the threshold. One was the posting-master, M. Labbé, himself; the other my old friend Cartier, the timber-merchant. Both recognised me at the same time.

"Why; you, my boy!" said Labbé. "Things have gone badly with you then if you have come down to being a postillion?"

Cartier gave me his hands.

"What the devil have you come in such an equipage as that for?"

I related the story of old Levasseur, then all that had happened in Paris.

It was now half-past eight; I had only two hours and a half in which to reach Soissons, and there were still nine long leagues to travel. The probability of succeeding was getting less and less, but I would not give in. I asked M. Labbé for horses; he brought me them immediately, and in five minutes time they were harnessed.

"My goodness," said Cartier to Labbé, "I mean to go along with them. I am curious to know how it will end." And he got in with us.

"Remember me to the postillion," I said to M. Labbé.

And he nodded his head.

"Jean-Louis," he said to the postillion.

"Yes, governor."

"You know old Levasseur?"

"By Jove, I should think I do!"

"You see that gentleman?" pointing to me.

"Yes, I see him."

"Well, he has just killed old Levasseur."

"How?" said the postillion, gaping at me.

"With a pistol shot."

"What for?"

"Because he wouldn't go full gallop.... So take heed, Jean-Louis."

"Is that true?" the man asked, turning pale.

"You can see for yourself, since monsieur has driven in himself and is using the whip and wearing boots of the deceased."

Jean-Louis threw one terrified glance at the whip and the boots and then he set off at a tearing gallop, without saying another word.

"Oh! my poor horses," Labbé shouted after us, "they are going to have a bad time of it."

We reached Villers-Cotterets under the hour, and here quite an ovation awaited me. I had hardly given my name to the first person I met whom I knew, than the news of my arrival by post-conveyance in a trap surmounted by a tricolour flag flew all over the town as rapidly as though it had been sent on telegraph wires. As the news spread, the houses turned out the living with as great unanimity as the tombs will discharge the dead at the sound of the Last Trump. All these living beings ran to the posting-house and reached it as soon as I did. Much explanation had to be given to make them understand my costume, my rifle, my sunburnt condition, the trap, the tricolour flag and why Bard and Cartier were with me. Everybody in that beloved countryside loved me well enough to have the right to put these questions to me. I answered them all, and when the explanations were given, they cried in unison--

"Don't go to Soissons! Soissons is a Royalist town!"

But it scarcely need be said that I had not come as far as Villers-Cotterets without intending to proceed to Soissons.

"I not only intend to go to Soissons," I replied, "but I shall do all in my power to reach it before eleven o'clock, even if I have to give twenty francs in tips to the postillions."

"If you offer them forty, you will not reach there in time," said a voice I knew; "but you will get there by midnight, and they will let you enter."

The voice belonged to one of my friends who lived at Soissons, the one who, fifteen years previously, when a child like myself, came, an hour before me, to make a suggestion to General Lallemand when a prisoner, similar to the one I put to him an hour later.

"Ah! is that you, Hutin?" I exclaimed. "What shall I do to get in?"

"You will get in because I shall go with you and insist on it.... I belong to Soissons and know the gatekeeper."

"Bravo! What time shall we have?"

"The whole night; but it would be best to arrive before one o'clock."

"Good! then we shall have time for supper?"

"Where are you going to have it?"

Ten voices shouted--

"With me! With me! With us!" and they began to drag me from front, from behind, by the lappets of my coat and the cord of my powder horn and the strap of my gun and the ends of my cravat.

"Excuse me," said another voice, "but he has been previously engaged."

"Ah! Paillet!..."

It was my old head-clerk. I turned towards my many hosts.

"It is quite true. I promised Paillet the last time he visited Paris to come and dine with him."

"So much the better," said Paillet, "since the dining-room is large and those who wish to come and take supper with us will find room enough.... Come, those who are his friends can follow me!"

A score of young fellows followed us--my old comrades, Saunier, Fontaine, Arpin, Labarre, Rajade and many more. We went along the rue de Soissons and stopped at Paillet's house. In a moment almost, thanks to old Cartier, who lived nearly opposite, an excellent supper was improvised. Cartier senior, Paillet, Hutin, and Bard sat down to table. The others sat round, and I had to relate the history of that marvellous epoch-making three days while I was eating, not a single detail of it having penetrated so far as Villers-Cotterets. There were many exclamations of admiration. I next passed to the story of my own mission. And here enthusiasm cooled down. When I announced that I counted on taking alone, by myself, all the powder in a military town of eight thousand inhabitants and eight hundred soldiers, my poor friends looked at one another and said, as General La Fayette had done--

"Why! you must be mad!"

But more serious still than this unanimous opinion of the inhabitants of Villers-Cotterets was that Hutin, a native of Soissons, agreed with their opinion.

"However," he added, "as I said I would attempt the thing with you, I will do so; only it is a hundred to one that before this time to-morrow we shall have been shot."

I turned towards Bard.

"What did I say to you when I proposed you should accompany me, Seigneur Raphaël?" I said.

"You said to me, 'Will you come and get yourself shot with me?'"

"And your reply?"

"I replied I should be only too happy."

"And now?"

"I am still of the same opinion."

"Bless me! my dear fellow, you can see, you can hear. Reflect in time."

"I have reflected."

"And you mean to come?"

"Certainly."

I turned to Hutin again,

"So you are coming?"

"Of course I am."

"Then that is all right," and I raised my glass.

"My friends! to-morrow evening, meet again here! Cartier, a dinner for twenty, on condition that it is eaten whether we are dead or alive. Here are two hundred francs for the dinner!"

"You shall pay for it to-morrow."

"What if I am shot?"

"Then I will pay for it myself."

"Hurrah for old Cartier!"

And I swallowed off the contents of my glass. They all took up the chorus, "Vive Cartier!" and as we had finished supper and it was eleven o'clock and the horses were in the trap, we got up to go.

"Ah! confound it, one moment," I said, reflecting; "we may have to deal with rougher adversaries to-morrow than old Levasseur, therefore let us really load our pistols this time. What gentlemen among you have bullets of the right calibre?"

My pistols took twenty-four size, and it would be a chance, indeed, to find bullets of that calibre.

"Wait a bit," said Cartier, "I can manage that. Have you any bullets in your pocket?"

"Yes, but only size twenty."

"Give me four of them, or rather eight; it is best to have a re-load...."

I gave him eight bullets. Five minutes later, he brought me them back, elongated into slug shot, so that they fitted into the pistols. They were cleaned out, loaded and primed with the greatest care; just as though preparations were being made for a duel. Then for the last time we drank to the success of the enterprise; embraced each other several times and got into the trap, Hutin, Bard and myself; the postillion mounted his horses, and we set off at full gallop along the road to Soissons in the midst of cries of farewell and cheers of encouragement from my dear good friends. Two hours after we had left Villers-Cotterets the gate of Soissons opened at the voice and name of Hutin, and the gatekeeper let us in to the town, little knowing he was giving entrance to the Revolution.