Such a roar as went up from that black assembly in which the white caps of women were dotted and the massed blue knots of the National Guard could be seen! It reached the council, drearily debating in the town house, and there was a general desire to adjourn. The air was electric with coming trouble. These duly elected members of the Commune felt themselves caught between two great unknown forces--the Government of Versailles, which was represented by the pushing surveyors of the engineers' corps, the first skirmishers of an army which was certain to come upon them from the north, and this uprising of the idlers and workspoilers of their own kind. Personally their Socialism was not deep-rooted. They had the national respect for small property-holders, and even if they possessed none themselves, Oncle Jean Marie or Tante Frizade were _proprietaires_ in their own right. When these heritages fell in none of their loving nephews and nieces would fight harder for their share than the red-begirt members of the Commune of Aramon. Only men like Keller Bey and Gaston Cremieux lived in a world beyond such things--and on the other hand were those who, like Barres and Imbert, had nothing to gain or to lose however fortune's wheel might turn. Pere Felix pushed his way into the dense masses about the entrance of the prison keep. He was sure of himself, but very indignant at those of the Commune who had allowed him to come alone. Of course it was not fitting that Keller Bey should expose his person, but if the twenty of Aramon had marched together in a body, each with his crimson scarf of office girding him, they might have dominated the mob and silenced the hair-brained Barres. Still, all the more honour to himself, when he should go back to twit them with their fears and tell them the story of his triumph! "We don't want to hear Pere Felix! Down with the traitor! Trample him, spit upon him!" He could not believe his ears. For then began a din such as he had never heard. The young men on the outskirts had seized the instruments of the band of the National Guard and were now blowing, bellowing, and clanging upon them. He stood beside Barres, who looked at him contemptuously, tossing the light fall of hair off his brow with a regular movement, as a challenged bull tosses his horns. "Comrades and citizens, in the name of the Commune of Aramon, elected by you, I address you----" Brazen horns brayed, tin trays and kettles were beaten, the big drum thundered just underneath. Words issued from the mouth of Pere Felix. They must have done so, for his lips were moving, but not even himself heard a word, and the sardonic smile on the face of the Catalan Barres became a grin. The old orator, who had swayed all meetings of the plebs in Aramon ever since '48, threw up his hands in hopeless misery. "They will not hear me," he cried, so that this time the words reached the ear of Barres. "Why will they not hear me?"