A Tatter of Scarlet: Adventurous Episodes of the Commune in the Midi 1871

This was a great disappointment to me, who had thought that an hour would see me inside the walls of the Château Schneider, talking with Mrs. Deventer or sneaking off into the conservatory or out upon the roof with Rhoda Polly for one of our long talks about everything in heaven above and on the earth beneath.

But it was very evident that Keller Bey had made up his mind, and, at any rate, I had galled him too bitterly in the beginning of our conversation to admit of my finishing it by asking a favour. I only shrugged my shoulders and said mockingly:

"Perhaps you would like me to lead your thousand men to Marseilles as well?"

"Indeed," he replied unexpectedly, "I am not sure but that it is an excellent idea – you are a friend of Gaston Cremieux. I could send you as civil delegate without awakening any jealousy among the chiefs of battalion. It is a suggestion which will bear thinking over – certainly not to be lost sight of."

* * * * *

I had many and excellent opportunities of watching Keller Bey in his new character of insurrectional leader during the days which followed. As every one anticipated, his name led the list of the new Commune by many thousands majority. The others came meekly behind, even the Père Félix only emerging from the crowd by a head.

What specially gratified Keller Bey was that no member of the noisy gang of wreckers had been chosen.

"What did I tell you?" he cried, patting me on the shoulder; "our Government is to be a model of firmness and sobriety."

And so it was, as far as Keller Bey could make it. But there remained dangerous elements of which he was ignorant, but which were very clear to Dennis Deventer, who had seen the leaven of evil at work for many years.

On the morrow began the organisation of the services of the new Government. It was a strange installation, and I sat there like a spectator in a good seat at a theatre and watched the play. None of those who were on the stage seemed to have any idea of the ridiculousness of the performance. Only I, outside all wire-pulling, saw the truth. The rest were hypnotised by the wonderful thing which had happened – a Commune at Aramon!

Hour by hour I saw Aramon being cut off from the world. At the first news of the election of a Commune the officials of the post office had disappeared. Piles of letters accumulated on the desks and before the ranged pigeon-holes. Sacks arrived by train so long as these were running, and were heaped in corners. The telegraphic machines were set down where the operators had abandoned them. I amused myself by calling up the different towns in our neighbourhood, but received answers only from Marseilles and Narbonne. The rest had nothing to say to a revolted city like ours. By and by Narbonne was abruptly cut off, probably at Cette or some intervening town favourable to the Government of Versailles.

Half of Keller Bey's time was taken up with such matters as the choice of a new post office staff. Where they came from I cannot imagine, these seekers after office. And their credentials! One highly recommended claimant for the office of receiver of contributions had been expelled by the brutal tyranny of Napoleon from a Tobacco Bureau. He had thereafter languished in prison, not, as he gave Keller to understand, as a political victim, but as a good, solid embezzler of Government money. Yet he was supported by a Commandant of the National Guards, a relative of his own, and but for my chance recognition of him, would doubtless have been appointed.

The post office staff was soon complete – director, assistants, money-order clerks, telegraph clerks, and messengers – postmen for the district town deliveries, postmen for the rural rounds – but after the first solemn sorting of the débris left behind by the old staff, not so much as a letter or a newspaper, to pass from hand to hand, even as a curiosity!

The civil services, the mayoral staff, the judges of the tribunal, judges of the commercial court, Procureur of the Republic and so forth gave a little more trouble. Père Félix was appointed President of the Tribunal, and his good nature and popularity promised easy sentences for the malefactors of Aramon. But they gave him for public prosecutor one Raoux, a little wizened wisp of a man, a shoemaker and bold orator of the bars, who in his readiness of denunciation threw Fouquier-Tinville into the shade, and in irreverence and insolence approached Raoul Rigault himself. Raoux was high in the National Guards, which Keller Bey had not yet begun to recognise as the power behind his throne. Consequently he had a real influence and soon aspired to nothing less than a ministry of justice, both making denunciations and by his authority sending the denounced to prison.

The officers of the city gaol were almost the only ones who remained of the civil servants of the Empire. They were mostly Corsicans, and as their chief Calvi said: "They had come to France to keep prisoners safely." He would give a receipt for each on arrival, and exact a similar receipt on his leaving the Château du Monsieur le Duc. But he would take the same pains with the prisoners of the new Government as with those of the old – and so, since, in fact, no Communard wished to become a turnkey, a garde-chiourme, Calvi and his staff were left in undisputed possession of the Central Prison and House of correction of the department of Rhône-et-Durance.

Some of the happenings were curious. The prisoners within, sentenced to various terms of reclusion and imprisonment under the Empire, found themselves on their release walking about in a world which knew not Joseph. Some were rearrested as spies, but even the vibrant little cobbler Raoux could not break down the excellence of the alibi which they had ready to hand.

Some alarmed good women by asking news of the Emperor, or loudly expressing disbelief in a café when the disasters of the war were hinted at. A ruffianly fellow, excited by his first cup of spirits for some years, offered to fight any man who dared to say that the Germans had entered Paris. So fiercely did he assault the original patriot who had mentioned the fact, that the rest of the party, gathered over their cards and mulled wine in the Café Jacquard, denied one by one that they had ever heard of such a thing. Finally the tyranny of the "nervi" or ticket-of-leave man became so overbearing that it took half a company of National Guards with fixed bayonets to convey him to the "gendarmerie," and from thence, after due committal, to the gloomy prison-house of Monsieur le Duc, from which he had been but three hours released. He had struggled gallantly against bayonet prick and rifle butt. The escort, amateurs at this kind of work, had pitied the few wardens who must handle such a desperado.

But when the first policeman appeared he merely bade the "nervi" lay his thumbs together, and in an instant he was leading the formidable warrior whither he would as submissive and obedient as a child. Calvi was called and came hastily in, donning a uniform coat, and leaving a half-played game of "dames" behind him.

He examined the order of the new Procureur. The stamp was as usual. The signature mattered nothing to Calvi, who looked up at the rioter with a kind of reproach.

"Number 333," he said, with severity, "if you had told us that we were to be honoured with your custom so soon again, you would have saved us the trouble of whitewashing your cell. Take care not to overturn the materials which have been left, make yourself as comfortable as you can to-night, and you can do the rest of the work to-morrow. Good night, gentlemen of the National Guard!"

He should have said "citizens," and every man knew it; but after all he was a miserable child of the Isle of Despots, and besides, no citizen, however loyal, objects to being called a gentleman once in a way.

Keller gave me work to do occasionally. I drafted proclamations and, after rounding the sentences to make them more sonorous, I carried them to the Communal printing office, which did not differ from other printing offices, save that, in the absence of a master, each printer lounged and smoked about the cases, or took himself off to the nearest grog-shop in the intervals of labour. Often I had to work Keller Bey's name for all it was worth, and threaten a guard and the Bastille of Aramon before I could get anything done.

Sometimes, during my long hours of waiting at the printing office of the Commune, I strolled up to the Aramon station. Only a stray lamp-cleaner sat with his legs dangling from the platform and spat upon the quickly rusting rails, looking over his shoulder occasionally to throw a remark to the single Garde National, who, though on duty, had laid his rifle and cartridge-belt upon a luggage-barrow, sought out a pile of "returned empty" sacks of coarse jute, arranged these to his mind, and finally had laid himself down on them, only rolling over occasionally to refill his pipe or to wheel his couch into a shady place or one more convenient for a friendly gossip. On the whole this was the man I liked best. His "relief," a burly fellow from the Hard Stone Quarries above the town, calmly divested himself of his coat, wrapped his feet in his cloak, drew his coat loosely over him, put his head on his knapsack, and slept his watch out on the green velvet cushions of the first-class waiting-room.

Above, the man really responsible, the station-master of Aramon Junction, was supposed to be busying himself with a report of the reopening of the line between Lyons and Marseilles. This news had been brought to Keller Bey by my friend of the travelling bed on the luggage truck. He considered it hard that Monsieur Weyse never came down to patrol the platform and pass the time of day. He yearned for society, and one of the comfortable arm-chairs in the station-master's room would have appealed to him strongly. It was the unseen official's own fault if a man so naturally companionable as he of the luggage-barrow were driven by neglect to prefer a complaint against him.

The expanse of empty quays and innumerable parallels of iron rails preyed on his spirits. He tired of the man who cleaned lamps and sat upon the stone parapet. He had already heard all his opinions, knew where he was going to place his oaths, and scented his grotesque and improper anecdotes afar off – with a sense of loathing because, in addition to all, the lamp-man spat with a regularity and vigour singularly disgustful to a Frenchman, who does not use his tobacco in the "plug" form.

I was sent to interview the station-master as to the famous report. I found him comfortably ensconced at his fireside, his legs embracing one side and the other of the hearth, a huge pile of the complete works of Victor Hugo, the Brussels edition, on a chair by his side. He was fathoms deep in the third volume of "Les Misérables." I never saw a man more enraptured nor one more enviable. I stood and looked at him, a broad, beefy man with a shrewd Scottish countenance. His uniformed coat and gold-broidered cap were neatly placed on a chair behind him. But the man himself, in a long blouse drawn well above his knees, so that he might feel the comforting of the fire, continued his reading without a pause, stirring the logs occasionally with his toe.

I was sorry to interrupt him, but I was resolved to make a friend, for here was a man with a set of Hugo. I had already been at the Municipal Library, but there, the collection dating entirely from the times of the Empire, it of course contained nothing of Hugo's later than "Hernani."

"Your servant, sir!"

Already at a mere waft of my entrance he had sprung to his feet and laid down his book.

"You take me a little by surprise – ah – from Keller Bey? Are you a Communard, young man?"

I reassured him. Keller Bey's family lived with my father across the water in Languedoc. I had been captured and had given my parole, but I was no partisan. I acted as occasional secretary to Keller Bey, that was all.

He shook his head sorrowfully, for I think the verdancy of my youth appealed to him.

"Do not run with the wolves too long or the wolf-hunters may not stop to ask the difference. There is a fable about that – which I have read somewhere – in Perrault or La Fontaine. Take back your parole and get out of Aramon. All this foolishness will go like that – " (he snapped his finger and thumb in the air), "and I only hope that I shall have time to read Hugo once through before I have again to think of a train every five minutes pouring north and south, east and west, through Aramon Junction!"

I put the question of the report as delicately as possible. I have rarely seen a Frenchman laugh more boisterously.

"But I have made no report. Why should I? I have received none and written none. The wires are cut in all directions. I have not a telegraphist on the place. There are my files if you want to look. Everything is going by the branch lines on the other side, but even of that I know only what I can see from my bedroom window, the white steam of trains trailing off among the green woods, and sometimes the dull rumble of a heavily laden goods convoy crossing a bridge. Of positive knowledge concerning railway affairs I have none. I sit and read Hugo and wait for the end of things. The old life will come back soon enough. Meanwhile I am earning my salary, and when traffic opens a pretty sum will be owing to me on the books of the company.

"See here," he said, chuckling, "this is my only report. I will write it before your eyes."

He pointed to a folio which lay open with the day and date, but all else blank. He took a pen and wrote:

"As yesterday – no change. Guards – Caspar and Nolli. Both quiet. Messenger from Communal Government to ask about a report I am supposed to be making. Exhibit this."

"There you are – you can copy that if you like. I give you my word of honour that is all the report I ever write, and that is just enough to prove me on the spot, able for duty, and to claim my pay!"

I told Monsieur Weyse that I would not trouble him further. I should explain the foolish rumour to Keller Bey, and in all things he might count upon me. At the same time if there happened to be any volume of Hugo he was not using – ! Well, he might imagine my gratitude.

He sprang to his feet with a kind of smothered whoop and began to delve among the pile which occupied the chair and slopped over upon the floor.

"Here – here," he explained, "take the first two volumes of "Les Misérables." It is the best of all. I shall read faster than you, for I have nothing else to do, and I keep it up far into the night. Why, my friend, if you come to-morrow, I shall have the third volume ready for you. No, no, don't thank me, but go instead and get your head clear of this noose. This Communist Aramon is going to be no safe place to play unpaid secretary in after a week or two. Those white wreaths of smoke against the Cevennes tell me that. The Company and the Government are working together over there, and when they are ready – it will be good not to be here and in your shoes!"

"But, Monsieur Weyse, you will be here!"

"Ah, that is different! I am a lonely man, and a servant in the way of his duty. Nothing can come amiss to me. Even if either side fortifies the junction buildings – why, I am the station-master acting for the Company. I sit and write my report once a day, and for the rest I read Hugo. Nothing is more simple. But as for you, take an old man's word. You are better anywhere than where you are!"

CHAPTER XXVII

UNDER WHICH KING, BEZONIAN?

The station-master was right. I saw how things were tending and how the revolt was sure to end. Yet I was by nature so curious of the oddities of the business that I put off speaking to Keller Bey. For one thing, I did not want to find myself shut up in the Duke's Castle along with the other martyrs of the new rule. I preferred the open air and risk. Besides, I could each day assure myself of the well-being of Dennis Deventer and his family.

I discovered where Jack Jaikes was usually to be found on guard, and, early in the dusk of the morning, I slipped from my room in order to speak half an hour with him in private. He first abused me like a pickpocket for taking sides with such a dirty pack, and it was with the utmost difficulty that he could be persuaded that there was after all a difference between a Communard and a prisoner on parole. He did not trouble to conceal his opinion of the latter.

"Jump over the wall," he whispered, "see, catch hold of my belt. I tell ye, man, in business we cannot afford to be so fine. I learned that in Glasgow long syne, when a brither-in-law o' mine took my job from me. Now, he was my brither, though not by blood, and in a manner o' speaking I had promised to love, honour, and obey. But instead I just bashed him till he was laid up in bed for six weeks – so I got my job back! Now tell me, where would I have been if I had minded about honour and 'paroles' and them things?"

It was in vain that I pointed out to Jack Jaikes that, after all, it was not he but his sister who had promised to love, honour, and obey the maltreated job-jumper.

"It doesna maitter. It's all the wan thing!" was all that I could get out of Jack Jaikes. "Now then, catch a haud and I'll hae ye beside me in the crack o' a cow's tail!"

Now, though I had fought duels on the sly at St. André on the most approved principles of French honour, I had done so chiefly because I possessed an excellent method and a supple wrist trained by years of the "Salle." Really I cared nothing about any artificial code of honour. But it was quite a different thing to have passed my word to Keller Bey, and entirely unthinkable to leave him in the lurch by making my escape without telling him.

I began about this time to imagine a vain thing. It seemed that in some way I could save both Keller Bey and the Deventers. I would be on both sides of the fence at once, and play a universal providence. I did not then see that I should end by being outlawed by both sides – as, save for a curious interposition, I should have been.

Jack Jaikes had, however, sufficiently impressed me that I went to Keller Bey and told him that he must trust me completely without any parole. He must give me back my word about escaping. I might (I explained) disappear for a time without leaving him altogether. In reality I did not mean to do anything of the kind, and if it came to any trouble about saving the Deventers, he would find me again at his side. All this I believed perfectly feasible at the time. Indeed, I spoke with such earnestness and spontaneity that he finished by shutting his eyes, even as I was doing, to the difficulties or, rather, impossibilities of the position.

Somehow he clung to my presence among these men to whom he was already no more than a symbol of authority. They did not know the man Keller Bey. I did. And he seemed to wish to keep me near him as a link with a past with which he had broken. In his heart I am sure he regretted the garden and his talks with my father and Professor Renard, while as to Linn and Alida, they did not simply bear thinking about.

Yet he was possessed by that driving fate, ambition, call of duty, what you will – which sends men forth from comfortable homes to battle for life about the frozen pole, to die miserably, to leave their bones there – though all the while in bright homes the loving hearts of women and the laughter of children are waiting for them.

Keller Bey was fate-driven. This Aramon rising had fallen accidentally in his way. The idealist in the man tempted him to believe that he could make a Socialist Land of Promise out of those factories and arsenals, which had grown up in such a beauty spot of nature, where (it was Keller Bey's word) "merely to be alive between sea, sky, and earth was a daily revelation of religion."

He thought nothing of the small questions of pay and personal interest which really made up the gist of the matter to the workmen. Perhaps also, though quite unwillingly, he had been led astray by Dennis Deventer. Dennis was an idealist also, and he saw the workmen's side of the question of private ownership. He would express these opinions with such dialectic sympathy that it almost seemed to the listener that he would be found one day persuading the owners of the factories to make over their possessions to the workers.

His wife often reproached him with this treachery of words.

"I know, I know, colleen," he would answer contritely, "'tis Irish Dennis hot in my brain that will get talking – then when I do things Deventer the Scot sets the count right."

"But, then, how about the people with whom you have talked, and who may be depending on your words?"

"'Tis more the pity of them," he would say quizzically, "but, anyway, I am no worse than these young chicks that you have brought up."

"That is nonsense, Dennis – you are the master and yet you talk like a 'red' as often as not – very likely when you have just sent Jack Jaikes to fix a new gun where it will command a street or a gate by which you may be attacked."

Then Dennis would hold up his hand in token of surrender. It was all gospel truth, due perhaps as much as anything to the family habit of free discussion, when Dennis would take up a losing cause and champion it to the bitter end.

There is, however, room to commiserate Keller Bey, from whom these things were hidden. He reported to the Commune of Aramon at its daily séances, of the favourable dispositions of the representative of the Company. Nay, during the space of a week, it was quite on the cards that the men should return to work on the basis of some half-understood (and wholly misunderstood) word of Dennis's, which Keller Bey and his Social Commission had taken to mean the admission of the men's right to a share in the half-yearly profits.

Fortunately or unfortunately, another phrase at a succeeding interview had revealed that Dennis Deventer had no intention of committing his owners to anything. Nor had he the power. He had merely been willing to cast his own salary and commissions into the common fund gained by all the workers, and leave the total to be divided by the committee according to their idea of equity.

But then, though this was exceedingly generous, Dennis was also a partner and a rich man. The men, except Keller Bey, were indignant at what they counted a cheat – a false offer. Very unjustly, for to Dennis Deventer the rights of labour extended to what a man earned. Those of property, equally important to him, included the defence of his wife's money invested in the Small Arms Company, and also what he had been able to put aside during the years of his strenuous life.

This is how the great misunderstanding arose, and I do not see that any of the parties to it were free from blame – certainly not Dennis.

But I hasten to tell how the events fell out and what was my part in the adventure.

The same day that I had required my parole back from Keller Bey I marched boldly and in the face of all to the gate of Château Schneider, which was shut and boarded up, strengthened besides by criss-cross work of iron bars, so that the half which was opened creaked and groaned on its hinges when it turned. So careful was the watch that when at last after parley and explanation Jack Jaikes let me in, it was only to find myself commanded by three separate batteries of machine guns from behind which peered the perplexed faces of McAllister's gang. They were simple men and they could not understand this running with the hare and hunting with the hounds. I do not blame them. No one who did not know Keller Bey and the need of standing by him could possibly have understood. Jack Jaikes explained as well as he could, but not being convinced himself of the goodness of my cause, I fear his words only darkened counsel.

It was generally understood by those on guard at Château Schneider that "I would bear watching," and indeed it was not long before the sentinels of the National Guard on the other side of the wall came to exactly the same conclusion, so to please all parties I was blindfolded.

But the welcome I had from the household of Deventer made up for all this enveloping suspicion. Here, at least, I stood clear. I was re-established in my own conceit, in my position a most valuable asset. Was I not a martyr to duty, a prisoner on parole, one castaway among wild and dangerous people, because I had ventured out by night to join the Deventer defence?