GRASSET. It has fallen; the Bastille has fallen! HOST. What say you? Speaks he the truth? GRASSET. Hear you not? [ALBIN wants to draw his sword.] FRANCOIS. Stop that at once, or we are all lost. GRASSET (reeling in down the stairs). And if you hasten, you will still be in time to see quite a merry sight ... the head of our dear Delaunay stuck on a very high pole. MARQUIS. Is the fellow mad? SHOUTS. Liberty! Liberty! GRASSET. We have cut off a dozen heads; the Bastille belongs to us; the prisoners are free! Paris belongs to the people! HOST. Hear you?--hear you? Paris belongs to us! GRASSET. See you how he gains courage now. Yes, shout away, Prosper; naught more can happen to you now. HOST (to the nobles). What say you to it, you rabble? The joke is at an end. ALBIN. Said I not so? HOST. The people of Paris have conquered. COMMISSAIRE. Silence! (They laugh.) Silence! I forbid the continuance of the performance! GRASSET. Who is that nincompoop? COMMISSAIRE. Prosper, I regard you as responsible for all these seditious speeches. GRASSET. Is the fellow mad? HOST. The joke is at an end. Don't you understand? Henri, do tell them--now you can tell them. We will protect you--the people of Paris will protect you. GRASSET. Yea, the people of Paris. [HENRI stands there with a fixed stare.] HOST. Henri has really murdered the Duc de Cadignan. ALBIN, FRANCOIS, and MARQUIS. What says he? ALBIN and others. What means all this, Henri? FRANCOIS. Henri, pray speak. HOST. He found him with his wife and he has killed him. HENRI. 'Tis not true! HOST. You need fear naught more now; now you can shout it to all the world. I could have told you an hour past that sue was the Duke's mistress. By God, I was nigh telling you--is't not true, you, Shrieking Pumice-stone?--did we not know it? HENRI. Who has seen her? Where has she been seen? HOST. What matters that to you now? The man's mad ... you have killed him; of a truth you cannot do more. FRANCOIS. In heaven's name, is't really true or not? HOST. Ay, it is true. GRASSET. Henri, from henceforth you must be my friend. Vive la Liberte!--Vive la Liberte! FRANCOIS. Henri, speak, man! HENRI. She was his mistress? She was the mistress of the Duke? I knew it not ... he lives ... he lives ... (Tremendous sensation.) SEVERINE (to the others). Well, where's the truth now? ALBIN. My God! [The DUKE forces his way through the crowd on the steps.] SEVERINE (who sees him first). The Duke! SOME VOICES. The Duke. DUKE. Well, well, what is it? HOST. Is it a ghost? DUKE. Not that I know of. Let me through! ROLLIN. What won't we wager that it is all arranged! The fellows yonder belong to Prosper's troupe. Bravo, Prosper! This is a real success.