ainst the wall, and then looked in each other's faces. Her
fury redoubled; threatening them collectively, addressing each
man by some vile nickname, pacing in front of them with a bold
swing of the powerful hips, the woman dominated them, intoxicated
them with her puissant influence.

They formed up in platoon.

"Fire!" cried the _cantiniere_.

Jean threw out his arms before him.

Two or three shots went off. He could hear the balls flatten against
the wall, but he was not hit.

"Fire! fire!" The woman repeated the cry in the voice of an angry,
self-willed child.

She had been through the fighting, this girl, she had drunk her
fill from staved-in wine-casks and slept on the bare ground,
pell-mell with the men, out in the public square reddened with
the glare of conflagration. They were killing all round her,
and nobody had been killed yet _for her_. She was resolved they
should shoot her someone, before the end! Stamping with fury,
she reiterated her cry:

"Fire! Fire! Fire!"

Again the guns were cocked and the barrels levelled. But the
_Vengeurs de Lutece_ had not much heart left; their leader had
vanished; they were disorganized, they were running away;
sobered and stupefied, they knew the game was up. They were quite
willing all the same to shoot the bourgeois there at the wall,
before bolting for covert, each to hide in his own hole.

Jean tried to say: "Don't make me suffer more than need be!" but
his voice stuck in his throat.

One of the _Vengeurs_ cast a look in the direction of the
_Pont-au-Change_ and saw that the _federes_ were losing ground.
Shouldering his musket, he said:

"Let's clear out of the bl--y place, by God!"

The men hesitated; some began to slink away.

At this the _cantiniere_ shrieked:

"Bl--sted hounds! Then _I'll_ have to do his business for him!"

She threw herself on Jean Servien and spat in his face; she abandoned
herself to a frantic orgy of obscenity in word and gesture and
clapped the muzzle of her revolver to his temple.

Then he felt all was over and waited.

A thousand things flashed in a second before his eyes; he saw
the avenues under the old trees where his aunt used to take him
walking in old days; he saw himself a little child, happy and
wondering; he remembered the castles he used to build with strips
of plane-tree bark... The trigger was pulled. Jean beat the air
with his arms and fell forward face to the ground. The men finished
him with their bayone