A Tatter of Scarlet: Adventurous Episodes of the Commune in the Midi 1871. Crockett Samuel Rutherford
Deventer had spoken with such determination and cold anger, that it took me with a new surprise to see him spring like a boy up the steel ladder on to the roof in answer to some call unheard by me.
Rhoda Polly followed, and Hugh and I did not stay behind. Rhoda Polly gave us both a hand.
"Mind your feet," she whispered, "there are all sorts of things scattered about."
I could hear the voice of Dennis Deventer somewhere in the darkness. The stars were still keen and bright, though the morning of the Midi was nigh to the breaking.
"Clear machine-guns three, four, and six," he ordered. "Train them on the doors of the fitting-shed. There are lights over yonder I don't like, and I can sniff the paraffin in the air!"
Deventer and I stood quite still with Rhoda Polly between us. Neither of us knew what to do. We had received no word of command, and what we had just heard had somehow dislocated our simple world of duty. We had imagined all the right to be on one side, all the wrong on the other. Now quite unexpectedly we saw the "tatter of scarlet" from a new angle. Its colour heightened till it glowed like a ruby. After all it stood for an idea – the ideal even which had brought us from school, and sent us on our wild-goose chase for Garibaldi.
The weak were to be supported against the strong. Perhaps, after all, those who had been long driven to the wall were at last to hold the crown of the causeway.
Meanwhile, peering into the night we could see the dark masses of men clustering about the street corners of Aramon. The stars were paling a little when we saw them suddenly bunch together and run towards the long tiled roofs of the fitting-sheds, filled with valuable new machinery. Lanterns winked and tossed as they went, torches flamed high, and there came to our ears a kind of smothered cheer.
"Are you there, Jack Jaikes?"
"Here, sir."
"Aim well in front of them, and let them have it as soon as they get close to the buildings. The ricochet from the walls will scare them as well as anything else."
There was no hesitation in the Old Man's fighting dispositions, whatever he might think privately of the men's cause. He would protect his master's property, and point out in the most practical way to the men that they were going the wrong way about to get their wrongs redressed.
"B-r-r-r! B-r-r-r!" whirred and spluttered the mitrailleuses. These first machine-guns made a curious noise like the explosion of many sulphur matches held one after the other over a lamp chimney. The effect, however, was wonderful. The black rush of men checked itself a score of paces from the fitting-sheds. Several fell to the ground, with a clatter of spilt petroleum cans, but the most turned tail and ran as hard as possible for the shelter of the streets and the trees along the boulevards.
One man only, very broad in the shoulders, bareheaded and belted with a red sash, kept on. He was carrying a torch dipped with tar, and this he thrust repeatedly under the doorway of the atelier.
"Give me Number 27, quick!" commanded Dennis Deventer. "I know who that man is, and I am sorry, but he must be stopped."
Jack Jaikes placed the rifle in the old man's hand, and everybody held their breaths. The lintel of the fitting-shed protected the fire-raiser a little. We could see him thrusting with his torch till the sparks and smoke almost enveloped him. Then he threw down the torch and ran heavily back. He took hold of the first jar of petroleum which had been abandoned in the flight, and was hastening back with it when Number 27 spoke. The man appeared to gather himself up. Then he made a spring forwards, spilling the oil in a gush in the direction of the smouldering torch.
But there came no answering burst of flame. The distance was too great. Dennis watched a moment after reloading, then shook his head gloomily.
"He was a good workman too – yet that does not help a man when once the maggot begins to gnaw underneath the brain pan."
The next day broke fresh and bright, with only that faint touch of Camargue mist which the sun dissolves in his first quarter of an hour.
From the roof and northern balcony we could hear a curious thudding sound in the direction of the moulding-works.
"The steam hammer," said Jack Jaikes; "pity we did not think to put her out of gear."
When he came down the chief listened a moment with his better ear turned towards the sound. Then he smiled ironically.
"They are trying to get a big field-gun ready for us. Luckily we have sent off the last we had in store. But they can't do it. At least they can't do it in time. There are good workmen and capital fitters among them, but who is to do their calculations?"
"No matter," grumbled Jack Jaikes, half to himself, "they will go by rule of thumb, and though their gun would not pass army tests, they will make it big enough and strong enough to drive a solid shell in at one side of this house and out at the other."
At that moment the girls came down for breakfast, and there was no more talk about the insurgents, or the state of siege at Château Schneider.
CHAPTER VII
OUR FIRST COMMUNARD
Hannah and Liz Deventer came in arm and arm. Hannah grave and sweet, with her air of taking admiration for granted and being rather bored by it; Liz dimpled and glancing from one to the other, deciding which of the young men would best serve her for cavalier that day. As for Rhoda Polly she had been in and out of the room for an hour, enforcing authority in the kitchen, rousing new courage in frightened servants whom only her example and abounding vitality shamed into remaining at their duty.
Dennis Deventer did not appear. Jack Jaikes came down presently and carried him up a pot of strong coffee and some rolls. Most of us hardly made even a pretence of sitting down, so eager were we to get back to our posts, but Hugh Deventer and a young apprentice, Laurent, the son of an English mother and a French father, stayed to keep the two younger girls company. As for me, I followed Rhoda Polly out upon the roof.
There I cleaned her rifle for her carefully, while she sat and watched me, her chin upon her palms. We were both quite comfortably hidden behind the stack of north-looking chimneys.
Rhoda Polly had always been a friend of mine, and there was no false shame between us, any more than between two college comrades of the same age and standing.
In quickly lapsing phrases she told me how the trouble had begun.
"It was," she said, "altogether a political matter at first. It had to do with the position of Procureur of the Republic, held by young Gaston Cremieux of Marseilles. He had been appointed by Gambetta in September, in the war year. But he was a 'red' and belonged to the Internationale, so that the solid people of the department, royalists for the most part, set about to try and dislodge him. He used to come often to our house, and he and father sat long arguing. I think we all liked him. He had great influence with the men up at the works, and so long as he was permitted to speak to them and go to their reunions, we had no trouble.
"But when Gambetta lost his power, and Thiers became dictator, or president, or something, Gaston Cremieux could not long remain Procureur. They stripped him of his office, and gave it to a dry-as-dust lawyer who did as the military tribunals bade him."
I put a question here.
"No," continued Rhoda Polly, with a flash of indignation, "if you knew my father better, you would know that he does not shelter himself behind anyone. Still, Cremieux was undoubtedly a help. My father can explain better than I can, but the men down here wanted to make our department a sovereign state like the American ones – New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, and so on."
"But," said I, "over there they have just fought a long and bloody war for the purpose of proving that no state is sovereign, but each must be subordinate to the central authority at Washington."
"Well, I don't know," said Rhoda Polly, "at least, that was the idea of these people down here, and I suppose all over France wherever there are many workmen. The peasants and agriculturists are different. They want only two things: low taxes and high prices."
Rhoda Polly was swinging herself back and forward on the low parapet which ran round the roof in so careless a fashion, that I begged