Within the schoolmaster's study he whom Duhamel called Maximilien strode to and fro, his hands clasped behind his back, his head bent, his chin thrust forward, denouncing the seigneurial system, of whose atrocity he had received that evening instances enough - for he had heard the whole story of La Boulaye's rebellion against the power of Bellecour and the causes that had led to it.
"We will mend all this, I promise you, Duhamel," he was repeating.
"But not until we have united to shield the weak from oppression, to restrain the arrogant and to secure to each the possession of what belongs to him; not until all men are free and started upon equal terms in the race of life; not until we shall have set up rules of justice and of peace, to which all - rich and poor, noble and ****** alike - shall be obliged to conform. Thus only can we repair the evil done by the caprice of fortune, which causes the one to be born into silk and the other into fustian. We must subject the weak and the mighty alike to mutual duties, collecting our forces into the supreme power to govern us all impartially by the same laws, to protect alike all members of the community, to repel our common foes and preserve us in never-ending concord. How many crimes, murders, wars, miseries, horrors shall thus be spared us, Duhamel? And it will come; it will come soon, never fear."
Caron stirred on the couch where Duhamel was tending him, and raised his head to glance at the man who was voicing the doctrines that for years had dwelt in his heart.
"Dear Jean Jacques," he murmured.
The stranger turned sharply and stepped to the young man's side.
"You have read the master?" he inquired, with a sudden, new-born interest in the secretary.
"Read him?" cried Carom forgetting for the moment the sore condition of his body in the delight of discovering one who was bound to him by such bonds of sympathy as old Rousseau established.
"Read him, Monsieur? There is scarce a line in all his 'Discourses' that I do not know by heart, and that I do not treasure, vaguely hoping and praying that some day such a state as he dreamt of may find itself established, and may sweep aside these corrupt, tyrannical conditions."
Maximilien's eyes kindled.
"Boy," he answered impressively, "Your hopes are on the eve of fruition, your prayers are about to be heard. Yes - even though it should entail trampling the Lilies of France into the very dust.
"Who are you, Monsieur?" asked La Boulaye, eyeing this prophet with growing interest.
"Robespierre is my name," was the answer, and to La Boulaye it conveyed no enlightenment, for the name of Maximilien Marie Isidore de Robespierre, which within so very short a time was to mean so much in France, as yet meant nothing.
La Boulaye inclined his head as if acknowledging an introduction, then turned his attention to Duhamel who was offering him a cup of wine. He drank gratefully, and the invigorating effects were almost instantaneous.
"Now let us see to your hurts," said the schoolmaster, who had taken some linen and a pot of unguents from a cupboard. La Boulaye sat up, and what time Duhamel was busy dressing his lacerated back, the young man talked with Robespierre.
"You are going to Paris, you say, Monsieur?"
"Yes, to the States-General," answered Maximilien.
"As a deputy?" inquired Caron, with ever-heightening interest.