As for the employment of the insurrectionary forces, that would be all
simplicity. It would, of course, be necessary to wait till the
companies were quite complete, and then advantage would be taken of the
first public commotion. They would doubtless only have a certain number
of guns used for sporting purposes in their possession, so they would
commence by seizing the police stations and guard-houses, disarming the
soldiers of the line; resorting to violence as little as possible, and
inviting the men to make common cause with the people. Afterwards they
would march upon the Corps Législatif, and thence to the Hôtel de
Ville. This plan, to which Florent returned night after night, as
though it were some dramatic scenario which relieved his over-excited
nervous system, was as yet simply jotted down on scraps of paper, full
of erasures, which showed how the writer had felt his way, and revealed
each successive phase of his scientific yet puerile conception. When
Lisa had glanced through the notes, without understanding some of them,
she remained there trembling with fear; afraid to touch them further
lest they should explode in her hands like live shells.
A last memorandum frightened her more than any of the others. It was a
half sheet of paper on which Florent had sketched the distinguishing
insignia which the chiefs and the lieutenants were to wear. By the side
of these were rough drawings of the standards which the different
companies were to carry; and notes in pencil even described what
colours the banners should assume. The chiefs were to wear red scarves,
and the lieutenants red armlets.
To Lisa this seemed like an immediate realisation of the rising; she
saw all the men with their red badges marching past the pork shop,
firing bullets into her mirrors and marble, and carrying off sausages
and chitterlings from the window. The infamous projects of her
brother-in-law were surely directed against herself—against her own
happiness. She closed the drawer and looked round the room, reflecting
that it was she herself who had provided this man with a home—that he
slept between her sheets and used her furniture. And she was especially
exasperated at his keeping his abominable infernal machine in that
little deal table which she herself had used at Uncle Gradelle’s before
her marriage—a perfectly innocent, rickety little table.
For a while she stood thinking what she should do. In the first place,
it was useless to say anything to Quenu. For a moment it occurred to
her to provoke an explanation with Florent, but she dismissed that
idea, fearing lest he would only go and perpetrate his crime elsewhere,
and maliciously make a point of compromising them. Then gradually
growing somewhat calmer, she came to the conclusion that her best plan
would be to keep a careful watch over her brother-in-law. It would be
time enough to take further steps at the first sign of danger. She
already had quite sufficient evidence to send him back to the galleys.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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