that unless you can dispel the suspicions to which these papers of yours give rise, unless you can satisfactorily explain certain unfavourable circumstances which they suggest, the Citizen-Representative Saint-Just will be fully occupied in answering for himself.' With a sudden fierceness, he added, bringing his fist down upon the table as he spoke: 'The Republic is no respector of persons. Get that into your head, Citizen Bontemps. Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity are not idle words.'
The Mayor mumbled eager agreement. He went on to urge the prisoner to answer, and to clear himself.
'I can't perceive,' said André-Louis, 'why you should hesitate, unless it is out of some false sense of loyalty. False, because no loyalty can save the principal offender. All that you can accomplish by silence and resistance is to find yourself convicted as a full accessory.'
Bontemps was not merely cowed; he was visibly frightened. André-Louis's fierce threat shook his confidence in the protection which Saint-Just might be able to afford him. If that protection were removed, then was he lost, indeed.
'Name of God!' he broke out. 'Of what is it that you accuse me? You have not told me even that. I have done nothing for myself.'
'You described yourself as a proprietor and farmer. I desire to know the source of the wealth which has enabled you to acquire these extensive tracts of land in La Beauce.'
'I described myself wrongly, then.' Fear squeezed the truth from him. 'A farmer, yes. I have become a farmer. It is more lucrative than being a horse-leech. But a proprietor, no. I am an agent, no more. What use to question me? You have my papers. They will have shown you that I am no more than an agent.'
'Whose agent?'
Bontemps still hesitated for a moment. He wrung his hands. Although the air of the room was so cold that their breathing made a mist upon it, yet there were beads of sweat on his pale, bulging brow below the straggle of red-brown hair. At last he answered, 'The Citizen-Representative Saint-Just's.' As if to excuse the betrayal wrung from him, he added, 'The papers must have shown it.'
André-Louis nodded. 'They do. At least, they indicate it very strongly.' Again he waited for Boissancourt to finish writing.
'In the course of the last year, you appear to have received moneys which will aggregate to close upon half a million francs if we make the computation reducing all to the present depreciated values of the Republic's currency.'
'If you compute it in that way, I suppose it would amount to about that figure.'
'One particularly heavy remittance of a hundred thousand francs reached you only a month ago.'
'Yes. Just about a month ago.'
'On the 7th of Frimaire, to be exact.'
'If you have the date, why question me?'
'This money was sent to you from Strasbourg, I think.'
'I don't know.'
'You know whence the Citizen Saint-Just wrote. For it was he who sent it to you, was it not?'
'Yes. It came from him. It came from Strasbourg, I believe. Yes. Anything else?'
André-Louis sat back. 'Set it all down, Boissancourt. Every word of it. It is important.' He turned to the Mayor. 'I am discovering much more than I bargained for; a conspiracy of quite another sort from that which I came to investigate. At the beginning of Frimaire the Citizen Saint-Just was in Strasbourg. He was levying heavy punitive fines there. Gold was flowing into his hands to be held in trust by him for the national treasury, money destined to relieve the sufferings of the faithful people. The Citizen Saint-Just appears to have misappropriated some of this to his own uses. That is what emerges from this investigation. You might add a note to that effect, Boissancourt, for reference later. And take care of these documents. They supply the evidence.' He paused, considering for a moment. 'That, I think, will do for the moment. I have no more questions. You may remove the prisoner.'
Boissancourt finished writing, and presented the minute of the examination to André-Louis. He read it carefully, and signed it. Then he passed it to the Mayor for his counter-signature, which was supplied so soon as the Mayor had also satisfied himself that the statement was exact. He looked pale and scared when he set down the pen.
'Name of a name! You have stirred up some terrible matters, citizen.'
'And it's my belief we are only at the beginning of them.'
The Mayor shivered. After all, the sunlight had passed from the room, and it was very cold there. 'We are treading very dangerous ground, citizen.'
André-Louis stood up. 'Very dangerous to malefactors,' he answered with a hardness that reassured the Mayor. 'Very dangerous to false patriots who cheat the Republic of her dues, who abuse their office to serve private interests. There is no danger to any other. The Nation will know how to reward those who labour to destroy corruption. There should be great things in store for you, Citizen-Mayor. I hope that you deserve your good fortune.'
'I have always been a good patriot.'
'I am glad to hear it. Do your duty and fear nothing. Fiat officium, ruat coelum. Let us be going. You will order the Commandant to bring along this fellow Bontemps, and to bestow him safely in the gaol at Blérancourt until we send for him.'
CHAPTER XL
THE DOSSIER
In what was still to do at Blérancourt, André-Louis employed a feverish diligence. For he never lost sight of the fact that, if a rumour of his activities should reach Paris, there would be an abrupt end to his investigations, and his head would probably pay the price of his assumptions of authority. Therefore, it was necessary to complete the work with all speed before discovery overtook him.
Also, as the days passed, the members of the Revolutionary Committee, whose President he had arrested, began to grow restive. It may be that these gentlemen were none too easy in their consciences and not knowing where these investigations, which seemed to be spreading in ever-widening circles, would come to end, began to be fearful on their own account. They began to question among themselves the extent of the authority of this agent of the Committee of Public Safety. Fortunately, the Mayor stood his friend, and gave him timely warning of these mutterings.
André-Louis took instant action. He ordered the Committee to be convened, and appeared before it. The ten members composing it—all of them local tradesmen—rose to receive him when he briskly entered the room in the Mayor's house where they were assembled, Foulard, himself, amongst them.
Peremptorily André-Louis ordered them to sit, and himself remained standing. The historion in him knew that thus he would more effectively dominate them. He planted his feet wide, set his hands behind him, and, hat on head, scowled upon them with those dark eyes of his which he could render so bitter. Thus for a long, almost breathless, moment in which he seemed to be weighing them. Then his voice, harsh and arrogant, lashed them without mercy.
'I hear of grumblings amongst you, citizens. It has come to my knowledge that some of you take the view that I am exceeding my authority; that you resent the extent to which I am searching into events that have been happening here in Blérancourt. Let me give you a timely word of warning. If you have a care for your heads, you will heed it. If you had a proper sense of duty to the Republic, a proper patriotism, you would welcome researches whose aim is to uproot that which is noxious to the common welfare; you would welcome all steps, even though they should transcend the bounds of my authority, which are calculated to serve that aim. But let me tell you that, far from exceeding my authority, I have not yet exerted it to the full. An agent of the Committee of Public Safety is vested with the powers of the Committee itself, and responsible only to the Committee for his actions. If you desire to test my powers to the full, continue to question them. I may then extend my investigations into the affairs of the questioners. For it will be my duty to assume that who resents my inquisitions has in his own conduct cause to fear them.' He paused to