Just at that moment, as if the governor of the Bastille was obeying the injunctions of the crowd, some artillery—men approached the guns, which they drew in, till at last they disappeared entirely.
The crowd clapped their hands; they had then become a power, since the governor had yielded to their threats.
Notwithstanding this, the sentinels continued pacing backwards and forwards on the platforms. At every post was an Invalide and a Swiss.
After having cried, “Down with the cannon!” the crowd shouted, “Down with the Swiss!” It was a continuation of the cry of the night before, “Down with the Germans!”
But the Swiss did not the less continue their guard, crossing the Invalides in their measured pacings up and down.
One of those who cried, “Down with the Swiss!” became impatient; he had a gun in his hand; he pointed the muzzle of his gun at the sentinel, and fired.
The ball struck the gray wall of the Bastille, one foot below the coping—stone of the tower, and immediately in front of the spot where the Swiss had passed. At the spot where the shot had struck, it left a white mark, but the sentinel did not stop, and did not even turn his head.
A loud murmur soon arose around the man who had fired, and thus was given the signal of attack, as unheard of as it was senseless,—a murmur more of terror than of anger. Many persons conceived that it was a crime punishable with death to fire a musket—shot at the Bastille.
Billot gazed upon the dark—green mass like to those fabulous monsters which in ancient legends are represented to us as covered with scales. He counted the embrasures at which the cannon might at any given moment be rolled back to their places. He counted the number of muskets the muzzles of which might be directed through the loop—holes at the assembled crowd.
And Billot shook his head, recalling to mind the words uttered by Flesselles.
“We shall never be able to get in there,” said he.
“And why shall we never be able to get in?” said a voice close beside him.
Billot turned round and saw a man with a savage countenance, dressed in rags, and whose eyes sparkled like two stars.
“Because it appears to me impossible to take such a mass as that by force.”
“The taking of the Bastille,” said the man, “is not a deed of war, but an act of faith. Believe, and thou shalt succeed.”
“Patience!” said Billot, feeling in his pocket for his passport.
The man was deceived as to his meaning. “Patience!” cried he, “oh, yes, I understand you! you are fat—you—you look like a farmer.”
“And I am one, in fact,” said Billot.
“Then I can well understand why you say patience! You have been always well fed; but look behind you for a moment and see those spectres who are now surrounding us. See their dried—up veins, count their bones through the rents in their garments, and then ask them whether they understand the word patience.”
“This is one who speaks well,” said Pitou, “but he terrifies me.”
“He does not terrify me,” said Billot; and turning again towards the man:—”Yes, patience,” he said; “but only for another quarter of an hour, that’s all.”
“Ah, ah!” cried the man, smiling; “a quarter of an hour; that indeed is not too much. And what will you do in a quarter of an hour?”
“During that time I shall have visited the Bastille, I shall know the number of its garrison, I shall know the intentions of its governor! I shall know, in fine, the way into it.”
“Yes! if after that you could only find the way out of it?”
“Well, supposing that I do not get out of it. There is a man who will come and show me the way.”
“And who is this man?”
“Gonchon, the Mirabeau of the people.”
The man gave a start. His eyes emitted flashes of fire.
“Do you know him?” inquired he.
“No.”
“Well, what mean you, then?”
“Why, I am going to know him; for I was told that the first to whom I might speak on the square before the Bastille would lead me to him. You are on the square of the Bastille; take me to him.”