“Ah, there! Yes, I am with you there. It was an awful cruelty. Oh! it was heart-rending! but even that, one must endure for the sake of liberty; besides, the woman was not one of us. She has had her training among the aristocrats, and yet dares to come down among us, the real patriots, and make speeches to us, mounted on our own stalls; for my part, I want nothing of the sort. Only she always pretends that Mirabeau, our great Mirabeau, speaks through her, as if he felt above coming to us himself—not at all, I tell you. _He_ does not scoff at the help which comes from us. The women of Paris adore Mirabeau. It is a pity, though, he sends a creature like that to tell us our duty and kill our husbands.” “But you have not told me who the woman is whom you seem to both fear and hate.” “Fear! Oh! there is not a woman, or, for that matter, a man living, who could make me fear for myself. Ask Marguerite—ask my sister; perhaps you know her, Dame Tillery, landlady of the Swan, at Versailles, if Margaret Doudel was ever terrified by mortal face. But, about this girl, I confess to you, monsieur, that I sometimes do feel a trembling about my heart. If any harm come to her, I think it would kill me; and it is true that the woman prowls about the neighborhood asking questions, like a mean, vicious cat, creeping up to a bird’s cage.” “Ha!” St. Just uttered this sharp exclamation with unconscious force. He was evidently disturbed. “Yes,” answered Dame Doudel, “I have noticed one thing,—we dames of the market have sharp eyes. This woman, to whom I used to sell flowers and fruit, when she carried her head high, as if she were Du Berry herself, contenting herself with a salad, when things turned against her—this woman is neither of the nobility nor the people, flesh nor fish, but may go with one, and then the other; I, for one, trust no such person. The women of the market are honest; but this woman is not one of them. She means to be our leader, but we want nothing of her. She does not love France half so much as she hates the queen. As if we could not win our rights without the help of such a creature as that. Oh, citoyen! the less you patriots harbor with such chaff the better.” “I will try and profit by what you say, dame, when I know who it is you warn me against; the more especially as you tell me that she bears some malice against Marguerite.”