The spectators in the gallery rise in their excitement and join in the general clamour. "_Vive la Liberté! Vive la Liberté!_" Robespierre staggers under these crushing blows, and shrieks in his despair-- "Liberty, indeed! She is no more! The triumph of those ruffians is her death-knell!" But the guards have entered. They surround the accused, and push them towards the door. Robespierre walks with head erect, and folded arms between two gendarmes. He does not even cast a glance on the crowd who had hailed his entrance with loud cheers, and who now hiss and hoot him. The public are descending and mix with the deputies. The whole floor is crowded. The Convention-hall where a loud, incessant buzzing is all that can be heard, resembles a gigantic beehive, for no single voice is distinguishable in the tempestuous clamour that follows that solemn act at last accomplished. A cry rises above the universal hum: "Long live the Convention!" but is instantaneously succeeded by another more mighty and prevailing shout: "Long live the Republic!" Meanwhile the accused have disappeared. CHAPTER XIV THE KNELL OF THE TOCSIN Urbain, who had witnessed Robespierre's signal defeat and downfall from a seat in the gallery, ran immediately to the Rue du Martroy, to warn Clarisse and Thérèse that their retreat at the Hôtel de Ville was no longer safe or secure. The man found Clarisse in the drawing-room. At the announcement of the fearful news, the mother's first thought was for her son. "Then Olivier is lost!" she cried. In Robespierre lay her only hope, for Robespierre alone could tear him from the grasp of the Committee. Now that Robespierre was vanquished and powerless, what would become of Olivier? Urbain, though he himself felt apprehensive, tried to reassure Clarisse, and at this moment Thérèse entered the room. She had heard all! What! Robespierre? Their safety, Olivier's safety, was in the hands of Robespierre! She came forward, and asked in amazement-- "What! the man that was here yesterday, our protector, was--" "Yes, it was he!" answered Clarisse, through her tears, "your grandfather's former secretary." As Thérèse, still trembling from the shock of hearing that name, was about to answer, Clarisse added hastily-- "Hush, child! Forget all his past, and think of him only as he was yesterday! He is now vanquished and fallen, and with him, alas! falls our last hope!" Thérèse, putting aside her own fears before her aunt's uncontrollable grief, mastered her emotion and drove back the tears which rose to her eyes, to dry those of Clarisse, speaking words of comfort and hope which she herself could not feel. "Do not give way to despair, mother! God will watch over us.... We have implored Him so much!"