The young conscripts brandished their weapons in all directions. Some wanted to protect the poor frightened blighter running towards them; others prepared to fire at him to protect Lefine, whom they took to be his victim; still others copied their brothers in arms without having decided yet who they should fire on; the appalled crowd scattered, fearing a shoot-out; several men who could have been taken simply for passers-by pulled pistols from their overcoats; National Guardsmen appeared, rifles at the ready ... Everyone was prepared to kill everyone else. Gradually calm was restored. One of the armed civilians came over to Margont, his weapon lowered to avoid any misunderstanding.

‘I’m delighted to see you safe! I’m Monsieur Palenier. As arranged, we were following you, but we lost you on the bridge because of that damned haycart! Where are the men we need to arrest?’ ‘Imbeciles! Incompetent imbeciles!’ was all that Margont could manage to splutter in response.

CHAPTER 35

MARGONT recounted the happenings to Palenier, who in turn relayed them to Joseph. When the latter heard that the Swords of the King had been planning to assassinate his brother, he flew into a terrible rage. But it was obvious that his shouting and recriminations were partly to camouflage his fear. He immediately mobilised all available forces but to little avail.

His personal police burst into various houses where they thought members of the Swords of the King were hiding and arrested some suspects. They went back to the ‘treasure-trove’ and picked up the man Margont had wounded. But as Leaume, with his mania for secrecy, had not told him anything, he could provide no new information. The man Lefine had shot had escaped with the others. There were drops of blood on the stairs, but the telltale trail ended abruptly in the courtyard - he must have taken care to stem the bleeding with a handkerchief. Lefine thought they would find him not far from Charles de Varencourt’s body, but that was not the case. Margont voiced the theory that it had taken so long for Joseph’s agents to surround the house - because Lefine had had trouble finding the building again - that Charles de Varencout had been able to prove his innocence to the others. Or else he had profited from the general panic and had managed to escape.

The only committee member they arrested was Catherine de Saltonges, and that was perfectly straightforward. She had gone home, thinking she had several hours before Margont and Lefine’s bosses realised they were missing, and was gathering her belongings, preparing to leave Paris, when Joseph’s police burst in. So it was the least culpable member, the one who had not wanted to be present at a double murder, that was arrested. She had been taken to Temple prison where Palenier interrogated her, but did not mistreat her, Margont having made him swear on his honour not to. Margont was also going to question her. But first, exhausted by the events of the past few days, he returned with Lefine to their barracks, to calm his rage and fears, and work out a tactic to make Catherine de Saltonges talk. For he was absolutely certain that she would give nothing away to Joseph’s agents.

CHAPTER 36

THE companies of the 2nd Legion were training in the courtyard, sullying the night with the din of their orders and discordant rhythmical steps. The voice of Colonel Saber could be heard at regular intervals bellowing a command, ‘In column formation!’ Then there would be the clatter of running steps, whisperings, the metallic clanking of a bayonet dropping to the ground, confused noises, hesitations, exasperated reprimands from the NCOs. Nothing ever went quite right and Saber would make them start all over again from the beginning. There he was, sitting straight up on his black horse, in full regalia, the Legion d’Honneur on his chest, pointing at wrongdoers with his sabre, for all the world like the god Odin trying to resurrect the Wild Hunt. But the heroic soldiers killed in battle would never get up again to defend Paris ...

Margont was recuperating his strength, stretched out on his bed -a real bed, not a louse-ridden palliasse. He was turning the button in his fingers and it gleamed in the moonlight. The distortions and the patterns caught the light in various ways, creating a changing mosaic of shadows and golden points. He felt as if he were handling a box of secrets that he would only be able to open once he had worked out the subtle mechanism. He applied his usual method of approaching the problem from several different angles, hoping that inspiration would strike, allowing him to see the button in a new way. And it did! To such an extent that he wondered if it was the same button ... Those symbols ... There was a sort of A, or a sort of 'A, or n ... An A with a strange accent, horizontal, and attached to the letter and rolled back on itself... A bizarre A’ surmounted by something ... Margont sat up suddenly. So suddenly that the button dropped from his fingers and fell on the floor. He could not quite take in the implications of what he had realised. His heart was thumping as if he were in danger; his muscles tensed - he was ready to attack; cold sweat trickled down his back ... His body seemed to have understood before his mind ... Margont wondered why he had not leapt up already to retrieve the button and examine it again. He rose and picked it up cautiously, as if it were one of those old hand grenades, which no army ever used any more because of their tendency to explode in the hands of the grenadiers supposed to toss them at the enemy. He held it in front of his eyes, closer and closer, to try to see it more clearly.

The strange consecutive marks he had mistaken for damage to the button were in fact the astonishing outline of symbols. It was not that the letter was very badly worn away, it was actually only a little damaged. What had misled him was that it was represented in a very unusual way. An A’ styled in the Cyrillic way and topped by a cross with triangular arms: the monogram of Tsar Alexander and the cross of the Opolchenie, the Russian militia. The button came from a Russian army uniform. Margont’s mind was immediately filled with unwelcome memories. How vivid they were! An expanse of grass spread itself rapidly across the floor: the immense Moscow plain unfurled in front of him, pushing back the walls of the bedroom as if they were mere straw. Lines and lines of French soldiers advanced elbow to elbow; Margont was marching with them, Lefine at his side. Cannonballs rained on them, mowing men down, dismembering them, throwing up unbelievable sprays of blood. ‘Close ranks! Close ranks!’ yelled Margont. The Russians were converging on them, dark-green multitudes slicing through the vivid green of the hills. They were shouting ‘Hurrah! Hurrah!’ seemingly contemptuous of the missiles raining down on them as well. They were everywhere, on all sides, terrible hordes hurtling down the slopes towards them. Margont was covered in blood, but it wasn’t his, or perhaps it was and he was well and truly injured; he no longer knew ... The lines collided, skewering themselves on the thousands of bayonets. A Russian infantryman charged Margont, his eyes blazing, his mouth stretched wide in a yell of rage, like one of the three Furies. A French soldier intercepted him, brandishing a bayonet, and the Russian, carried away in a trance by his ardour, was impaled on the point. He used his last seconds of life to fire point-blank at his adversary’s stomach. The two soldiers collapsed at Margont’s feet. They seemed to be arm in arm, their lips touching in a bloody parody of a kiss. Margont was wreathed in gun smoke. All around him, figures were massacring each other, making an absurd Chinese shadow theatre. The plain was gradually filling with a reddish light.