There, in a few moments, a group was formed, in which the Representatives Canet and Favreau began to speak. One universal cry was raised, "Let us search for Dupin, let us drag him here if it is necessary."

They opened the gla.s.s door and rushed into the gallery. This time M.

Dupin was at home. M. Dupin, having learnt that the gendarmes had cleared out the Hall, had come out of his hiding-place. The a.s.sembly being thrown prostrate, Dupin stood erect. The law being made prisoner, this man felt himself set free.

The group of Representatives, led by MM. Canet and Favreau, found him in his study.

There a dialogue ensued. The Representatives summoned the President to put himself at their head, and to re-enter the Hall, he, the man of the a.s.sembly, with them, the men of the Nation.

M. Dupin refused point-blank, maintained his ground, was very firm, and clung bravely to his nonent.i.ty.

"What do you want me to do?" said he, mingling with his alarmed protests many law maxims and Latin quotations, an instinct of chattering jays, who pour forth all their vocabulary when they are frightened. "What do you want me to do? Who am I? What can I do? I am nothing. No one is any longer anything. _Ubi nihil, nihil_. Might is there. Where there is Might the people lose their Rights. _Novus nascitur ordo_. Shape your course accordingly. I am obliged to submit. _Dura lex, sed lex_. A law of necessity we admit, but not a law of right. But what is to be done? I ask to be let alone. I can do nothing. I do what I can. I am not wanting in good will. If I had a corporal and four men, I would have them killed."

"This man only recognizes force," said the Representatives. "Very well, let us employ force."

They used violence towards him, they girded him with a scarf like a cord round his neck, and, as they had said, they dragged him towards the Hall, begging for his "liberty," moaning, kicking--I would say wrestling, if the word were not too exalted.

Some minutes after the clearance, this Salle des Pas Perdus, which had just witnessed Representatives pa.s.s by in the clutch of gendarmes, saw M. Dupin in the clutch of the Representatives.

They did not get far. Soldiers barred the great green folding-doors.

Colonel Espina.s.se hurried thither, the commander of the gendarmerie came up. The b.u.t.t-ends of a pair of pistols were seen peeping out of the commander's pocket.

The colonel was pale, the commander was pale, M. Dupin was livid. Both sides were afraid. M. Dupin was afraid of the colonel; the colonel a.s.suredly was not afraid of M. Dupin, but behind this laughable and miserable figure he saw a terrible phantom rise up--his crime, and he trembled. In Homer there is a scene where Nemesis appears behind Thersites.

M. Dupin remained for some moments stupefied, bewildered and speechless.

The Representative Gambon exclaimed to him,--

"Now then, speak, M. Dupin, the Left does not interrupt you."

Then, with the words of the Representatives at his back, and the bayonets of the soldiers at his breast, the unhappy man spoke. What his mouth uttered at this moment, what the President of the Sovereign a.s.sembly of France stammered to the gendarmes at this intensely critical moment, no one could gather.

Those who heard the last gasps of this moribund cowardice, hastened to purify their ears. It appears, however, that he stuttered forth something like this:--

"You are Might, you have bayonets; I invoke Right and I leave you. I have the honor to wish you good day."

He went away.

They let him go. At the moment of leaving he turned round and let fall a few more words. We will not gather them up. History has no rag-picker's basket.

[3] This grated door was closed on December 2, and was not reopened until the 12th March, when M. Louis Bonaparte came to inspect the works of the Hall of the Corps Legislatif.

CHAPTER IX.

AN END WORSE THAN DEATH

We should have been glad to have put aside, never to have spoken of him again, this man who had borne for three years this most honorable t.i.tle, President of the National a.s.sembly of France, and who had only known how to be lacquey to the majority. He contrived in his last hour to sink even lower than could have been believed possible even for him. His career in the a.s.sembly had been that of a valet, his end was that of a scullion.

The unprecedented att.i.tude that M. Dupin a.s.sumed before the gendarmes when uttering with a grimace his mockery of a protest, even engendered suspicion. Gambion exclaimed, "He resists like an accomplice. He knew all."

We believe these suspicions to be unjust. M. Dupin knew nothing. Who indeed amongst the organizers of the _coup d'etat_ would have taken the trouble to make sure of his joining them? Corrupt M. Dupin? was it possible? and, further, to what purpose? To pay him? Why? It would be money wasted when fear alone was enough. Some connivances are secured before they are sought for. Cowardice is the old fawner upon felony. The blood of the law is quickly wiped up. Behind the a.s.sa.s.sin who holds the poniard comes the trembling wretch who holds the sponge.

Dupin took refuge in his study. They followed him. "My G.o.d!" he cried, "can't they understand that I want to be left in peace."

In truth they had tortured him ever since the morning, in order to extract from him an impossible sc.r.a.p of courage.

"You ill-treat me worse than the gendarmes," said he.

The Representatives installed themselves in his study, seated themselves at his table, and, while he groaned and scolded in an arm-chair, they drew up a formal report of what had just taken place, as they wished to leave an official record of the outrage in the archives.

When the official report was ended Representative Canet read it to the President, and offered him a pen.

"What do you want me to do with this?" he asked.

"You are the President," answered Canet. "This is our last sitting. It is your duty to sign the official report."

This man refused.

CHAPTER X.

THE BLACK DOOR

M. Dupin is a matchless disgrace.

Later on he had his reward. It appears that he became some sort of an Attorney-General at the Court of Appeal.

M. Dupin renders to Louis Bonaparte the service of being in his place the meanest of men.

To continue this dismal history.

The Representatives of the Right, in their first bewilderment caused by the _coup d'etat_, hastened in large numbers to M. Daru, who was Vice-President of the a.s.sembly, and at the same time one of the Presidents of the Pyramid Club. This a.s.sociation had always supported the policy of the Elysee, but without believing that a _coup d'etat_ was premeditated. M. Daru lived at No. 75, Rue de Lille.

Towards ten o'clock in the morning about a hundred of these Representatives had a.s.sembled at M. Daru's home. They resolved to attempt to penetrate into the Hall where the a.s.sembly held its sittings.

The Rue de Lille opens out into the Rue de Bourgogne, almost opposite the little door by which the Palace is entered, and which is called the Black Door.

They turned their steps towards this door, with M. Daru at their head.

They marched arm in arm and three abreast. Some of them had put on their scarves of office. They took them off later on.

The Black Door, half-open as usual, was only guarded by two sentries.

Some of the most indignant, and amongst them M. de Kerdrel, rushed towards this door and tried to pa.s.s. The door, however, was violently shut, and there ensued between the Representatives and the _sergents de ville_ who hastened up, a species of struggle, in which a Representative had his wrist sprained.