Notre-Dame de Paris Part 51

"Master Philippe Lheulier, advocate extraordinary of the king."

"And that big, black tom-cat on the left?"

"Master Jacques Charmolue, procurator of the king in the Ecclesiastical Court, with the gentlemen of the officialty."

"Come now, monsieur," said Gringoire, "pray what are all those fine fellows doing yonder?"

"They are judging."

"Judging whom? I do not see the accused."

"'Tis a woman, sir. You cannot see her. She has her back turned to us, and she is hidden from us by the crowd. Stay, yonder she is, where you see a group of partisans."

"Who is the woman?" asked Gringoire. "Do you know her name?"

"No, monsieur, I have but just arrived. I merely a.s.sume that there is some sorcery about it, since the official is present at the trial."

"Come!" said our philosopher, "we are going to see all these magistrates devour human flesh. 'Tis as good a spectacle as any other."

"Monsieur," remarked his neighbor, "think you not, that Master Jacques Charmolue has a very sweet air?"

"Hum!" replied Gringoire. "I distrust a sweetness which hath pinched nostrils and thin lips."

Here the bystanders imposed silence upon the two chatterers. They were listening to an important deposition.

"Messeigneurs," said an old woman in the middle of the hall, whose form was so concealed beneath her garments that one would have p.r.o.nounced her a walking heap of rags; "Messeigneurs, the thing is as true as that I am la Falourdel, established these forty years at the Pont Saint Michel, and paying regularly my rents, lord's dues, and quit rents; at the gate opposite the house of Ta.s.sin-Caillart, the dyer, which is on the side up the river--a poor old woman now, but a pretty maid in former days, my lords. Some one said to me lately, 'La Falourdel, don't use your spinning-wheel too much in the evening; the devil is fond of combing the distaffs of old women with his horns. 'Tis certain that the surly monk who was round about the temple last year, now prowls in the City. Take care, La Falourdel, that he doth not knock at your door.' One evening I was spinning on my wheel, there comes a knock at my door; I ask who it is. They swear. I open. Two men enter. A man in black and a handsome officer. Of the black man nothing could be seen but his eyes, two coals of fire. All the rest was hat and cloak. They say to me,--'The Sainte-Marthe chamber.'--'Tis my upper chamber, my lords, my cleanest.

They give me a crown. I put the crown in my drawer, and I say: 'This shall go to buy tripe at the slaughter-house of la Gloriette to-morrow.'

We go up stairs. On arriving at the upper chamber, and while my back is turned, the black man disappears. That dazed me a bit. The officer, who was as handsome as a great lord, goes down stairs again with me. He goes out. In about the time it takes to spin a quarter of a handful of flax, he returns with a beautiful young girl, a doll who would have shone like the sun had she been coiffed. She had with her a goat; a big billy-goat, whether black or white, I no longer remember. That set me to thinking.

The girl does not concern me, but the goat! I love not those beasts, they have a beard and horns. They are so like a man. And then, they smack of the witches, sabbath. However, I say nothing. I had the crown.

That is right, is it not, Monsieur Judge? I show the captain and the wench to the upper chamber, and I leave them alone; that is to say, with the goat. I go down and set to spinning again--I must inform you that my house has a ground floor and story above. I know not why I fell to thinking of the surly monk whom the goat had put into my head again, and then the beautiful girl was rather strangely decked out. All at once, I hear a cry upstairs, and something falls on the floor and the window opens. I run to mine which is beneath it, and I behold a black ma.s.s pa.s.s before my eyes and fall into the water. It was a phantom clad like a priest. It was a moonlight night. I saw him quite plainly. He was swimming in the direction of the city. Then, all of a tremble, I call the watch. The gentlemen of the police enter, and not knowing just at the first moment what the matter was, and being merry, they beat me. I explain to them. We go up stairs, and what do we find? my poor chamber all blood, the captain stretched out at full length with a dagger in his neck, the girl pretending to be dead, and the goat all in a fright.

'Pretty work!' I say, 'I shall have to wash that floor for more than a fortnight. It will have to be sc.r.a.ped; it will be a terrible job.' They carried off the officer, poor young man, and the wench with her bosom all bare. But wait, the worst is that on the next day, when I wanted to take the crown to buy tripe, I found a dead leaf in its place."

The old woman ceased. A murmur of horror ran through the audience.

"That phantom, that goat,--all smacks of magic," said one of Gringoire's neighbors.

"And that dry leaf!" added another.

"No doubt about it," joined in a third, "she is a witch who has dealings with the surly monk, for the purpose of plundering officers."

Gringoire himself was not disinclined to regard this as altogether alarming and probable.

"Goody Falourdel," said the president majestically, "have you nothing more to communicate to the court?"

"No, monseigneur," replied the crone, "except that the report has described my house as a hovel and stinking; which is an outrageous fas.h.i.+on of speaking. The houses on the bridge are not imposing, because there are such mult.i.tudes of people; but, nevertheless, the butchers continue to dwell there, who are wealthy folk, and married to very proper and handsome women."

The magistrate who had reminded Gringoire of a crocodile rose,--

"Silence!" said he. "I pray the gentlemen not to lose sight of the fact that a dagger was found on the person of the accused. Goody Falourdel, have you brought that leaf into which the crown which the demon gave you was transformed?

"Yes, monseigneur," she replied; "I found it again. Here it is."

A bailiff banded the dead leaf to the crocodile, who made a doleful shake of the head, and pa.s.sed it on to the president, who gave it to the procurator of the king in the ecclesiastical court, and thus it made the circuit of the hail.

"It is a birch leaf," said Master Jacques Charmolue. "A fresh proof of magic."

A counsellor took up the word.

"Witness, two men went upstairs together in your house: the black man, whom you first saw disappear and afterwards swimming in the Seine, with his priestly garments, and the officer. Which of the two handed you the crown?" The old woman pondered for a moment and then said,--"The officer."

A murmur ran through the crowd.

"Ah!" thought Gringoire, "this makes some doubt in my mind."

But Master Philippe Lheulier, advocate extraordinary to the king, interposed once more.

"I will recall to these gentlemen, that in the deposition taken at his bedside, the a.s.sa.s.sinated officer, while declaring that he had a vague idea when the black man accosted him that the latter might be the surly monk, added that the phantom had pressed him eagerly to go and make acquaintance with the accused; and upon his, the captain's, remarking that he had no money, he had given him the crown which the said officer paid to la Falourdel. Hence, that crown is the money of h.e.l.l."

This conclusive observation appeared to dissipate all the doubts of Gringoire and the other sceptics in the audience.

"You have the doc.u.ments, gentlemen," added the king's advocate, as he took his seat; "you can consult the testimony of Phoebus de Chateaupers."

At that name, the accused sprang up, her head rose above the throng.

Gringoire with horror recognized la Esmeralda.

She was pale; her tresses, formerly so gracefully braided and spangled with sequins, hung in disorder; her lips were blue, her hollow eyes were terrible. Alas!

"Phoebus!" she said, in bewilderment; "where is he? O messeigneurs!

before you kill me, tell me, for pity sake, whether he still lives?"

"Hold your tongue, woman," replied the president, "that is no affair of ours."

"Oh! for mercy's sake, tell me if he is alive!" she repeated, clasping her beautiful emaciated hands; and the sound of her chains in contact with her dress, was heard.

"Well!" said the king's advocate roughly, "he is dying. Are you satisfied?"

The unhappy girl fell back on her criminal's seat, speechless, tearless, white as a wax figure.

The president bent down to a man at his feet, who wore a gold cap and a black gown, a chain on his neck and a wand in his hand.

"Bailiff, bring in the second accused."

All eyes turned towards a small door, which opened, and, to the great agitation of Gringoire, gave pa.s.sage to a pretty goat with horns and hoofs of gold. The elegant beast halted for a moment on the threshold, stretching out its neck as though, perched on the summit of a rock, it had before its eyes an immense horizon. Suddenly it caught sight of the gypsy girl, and leaping over the table and the head of a clerk, in two bounds it was at her knees; then it rolled gracefully on its mistress's feet, soliciting a word or a caress; but the accused remained motionless, and poor Djali himself obtained not a glance.

"Eh, why--'tis my villanous beast," said old Falourdel, "I recognize the two perfectly!"

Jacques Charmolue interfered.