CHAPTER EIGHT

       Maurin the Lawyer

       Table of Contents

      There was quite a crowd in the café. A number of idlers and quidnuncs had drifted out by now from Paris bringing with them news of the great event, and of the minor happenings that clustered round it. Philipe d'Orléans, now known as Philipe Égalité, Louis Capet's own cousin, had driven in a smart cabriolet to the Place de la Révolution, and watched his kinsman's head fall under the guillotine. "A good patriot, what?" was the universal comment on his attitude. The priest who had been with Capet to the last had mysteriously disappeared at the very moment when, in the Hall of Justice, a decree had been promulgated ordering his arrest. He was, it seems, a dangerous conspirator whom traitors in the pay of Austria had sent to the Temple prison as a substitute for the priest chosen by the Convention to attend on Louis Capet. This news was received with execration. But the priest could not have gone far. The police would soon get him, and he would then pay his second visit to Madame la Guillotine with no chance of paying her a third.

      That was the general trend of conversation in the Café Tison: the telling of news and the comments thereon. Louis Maurin and Blakeney had secured a table in a quiet corner of the room; they ordered coffee and Fine, and the lawyer told the waiter to bring him pen, ink and paper. These were set before him. He said a polite "Will you excuse me?" to his vis-à-vis before settling down to write. When he had finished what appeared to be a longish letter, he slipped it into an envelope, closed and addressed it, and then summoned the waiter back. He handed him the letter together with some small money, and said peremptorily:

      "There is a commissionaire outside. Give him this and tell him to take it at once to the Town Hall."

      The waiter said: "Yes, citizen!" and went out with the letter, after which short incident the two men sat on silently opposite one another for a time, sipping their coffee and Fine, watching the bustling crowd around them, and listening to the chatter and comments and expressions of approval and disapproval more or less earsplitting, as the news of the quidnuncs brought were welcome or the reverse.

      And suddenly Maurin came out with an abrupt question:

      "Who was that with old Levet just now, Monsieur le Professeur?" he asked. "Do you happen to know? He was dressed like a priest. I am sure I saw a cassock."

      He blurted this out in a loud, rasping voice, almost as if he felt irritated by Monsieur le Professeur's composure and desired to upset it. He did not know, astute lawyer though he was, that he was sitting opposite a man whom no power on earth could ever ruffle or disturb. The man to him was just a black-coated worker like himself, a professor at some university or other, a Frenchman, of course, judging from his precise and highly cultured speech.

      "I saw no one," Blakeney replied simply. "Perhaps it was a priest called in to attend Madame Levet. You heard Mademoiselle Blanche say that her mother was dying."

      "Dead, I understood," Maurin commented dryly. "But Levet, anyhow, had no need to send for a priest. His own son is a calotin."

      "Indeed? Then it must have been the doctor."

      "The doctor? No, Blanche and I went to fetch Dr. Pradel but he was not in."

      Maurin remained silent for a minute or two and then said decisively:

      "I am sure — or nearly sure that it was not Pradel. Of course the fog was very dense and I may have been mistaken. But I don't think I was. At any rate..."

      He paused, and thoughtfully sipped his coffee over the rim of his cup; he seemed to be watching his vis-à-vis very intently.

      Suddenly he said:

      "I shall be going to the Town Hall presently. Will you accompany me, Monsieur le Professeur?"

      "To the Town Hall? I regret but I..."

      "It won't take up much of your time," the young lawyer insisted, "and your presence would be very helpful to me."

      "How so?"

      "As a witness."

      "Would you mind explaining? I don't quite understand."

      Maurin called for another Fine, drank it down at a gulp and went on:

      "Should I be boring you, Monsieur le Professeur, if I were to tell you something of my own sentimental history. You are, I know, an intimate friend of the Levets, and my story is closely connected with theirs. Shall I be boring you?" he reiterated.

      "Not in the least," Blakeney answered courteously.

      The young man leaned across the table and lowering his voice to a whisper he began:

      "I love Blanche Levet. My great desire is to make her my wife. Unfortunately her father hates me like poison. Though I am a moderate, if convinced Republican, he classes me with all those whom he calls assassins and regicides." He paused a moment, then once more insisted: "You are quite sure that this does not bore you, Monsieur le Professeur?"

      "Quite sure," Blakeney replied.

      "You are very kind. I was hoping to enlist your sympathy, perhaps your co-operation, because Blanche has often told me that old Levet has a great regard for you."

      "And I for him."

      "Quite so. Now, my dear Professeur," the lawyer went on confidentially, "when I saw just now old Levet introducing a man surreptitiously into his house, a scheme suggested itself to me which I fervently hope will bring about my union with the woman of my choice. I cannot tell you what put it into my head that Levet was acting surreptitiously, all I know is that the thought did occur to me, and that it gave rise in my mind to the scheme which, with your permission, I will now put before you, as I say, with a view to soliciting your kind co-operation. Will you allow me to proceed?"

      "Please do," Blakeney responded. "You interest me enormously."

      "You are very kind."

      Once more the lawyer paused. The noise in the room made conversation difficult. He leaned further over the table, and went on still in a subdued tone of voice:

      "Whether the man who was with Charles Levet just now, and whom he took into his house was a genuine priest or not, I neither know nor care. He may be the fugitive