vention, the outlawry of the members of the insurgent
Commune, of the members of the Council General who are its abettors and
of all such citizens as shall listen to its appeal.

Outlawry, death without trial! The mere thought pales the cheek of the
most determined. Gamelin feels the icy sweat on his brow. He watches the
crowd hurrying with all speed from the Place. Turning his head, he finds
that the Hall, packed but now with Councillors, is almost empty. But
they have fled in vain; their signatures attest their attendance.

It is two in the morning. The Incorruptible is in the neighbouring Hall,
in deliberation with the Commune and the proscribed representatives.

Gamelin casts a despairing look over the dark Square below. By the light
of the lanterns he can see the wooden candles above the grocer's shop
knocking together like ninepins; the street lamps shiver and swing; a
high wind has sprung up. Next moment a deluge of rain comes down; the
Place empties entirely; such as the fear of the Convention and its dread
decree had not put to flight scatter in terror of a wetting. Hanriot's
guns are abandoned, and when the lightning reveals the troops of the
Convention debouching simultaneously from the Rue Antoine and from the
Quai, the approaches to the Hotel de Ville are utterly deserted.

At last Maximilien has resolved to make appeal from the decree of the
Convention to his own Section,--the _Section des Piques_.

The Council General sends for swords, pistols, muskets. But now the
clash of arms, the trampling of feet and the shiver of broken glass fill
the building. The troops of the Convention sweep by like an avalanche
across the Hall of Deliberation, and pour into the Council Chamber. A
shot rings out; Gamelin sees Robespierre fall; his jaw is broken. He
himself grasps his knife, the six-sous knife that, one day of bitter
scarcity, had cut bread for a starving mother, the same knife that, one
summer evening at a farm at Orangis, Elodie had held in her lap, when
she cried the forfeits. He opens it, tries to plunge it into his heart,
but the blade strikes on a rib, closes on the handle, the catch giving
way, and two fingers are badly cut. Gamelin falls, the blood pouring
from the wounds. He lies quite still, but the cold is cruel, and he is
trampled underfoot in the turmoil of a fearful struggle. Through the
hurly-burly he can distinctly hear the voice of the young dragoon Henry,
shouting:

"The tyrant is no more;