Here, too, I had left a crowd in the passages, and on the stairs. Not a man remained. The house seemed to be dead; at noon-day with the sun shining outside. I saw no one, heard no one, until I reached the door of the room in which I had left the Committee and entered. Here, at last, I found life; but the same silence. Round the table were seated some dozen of the members of the Committee. On seeing me they started, like men detected in an act of which they were ashamed, some continuing to sit, sullen and scowling, with their elbows on the table, others stooping to their neighbours' ears to whisper, or listen. I noticed that many were pale and all gloomy; and though the room was light, and hot noon poured in through three windows, a something grim in the silence, and the air of expectation which prevailed, struck a chill to my heart. Father Benôit was not of them, but Baton was, and the lawyer, and the grocer, and the two gentlemen, and one of the Curés, and Doury--the last-named pale and cringing, with fear sitting heavily on him. I might have thought, at a first glance round, that nothing which had happened outside was known to them; that they were ignorant alike of the duel and the riot; but a second glance assured me that they knew all, and more than I did; so many of them, when they had once met my eyes, looked away. "What has happened?" I asked, standing half-way between the door and the long table. "Don't you know, Monsieur?" "No," I muttered, staring at them. Even here that distant murmur filled the air. "But you were at the duel, M. le Vicomte?" The speaker was Buton. "Yes," I said nervously. "But what of that? I saw M. le Marquis safe on his way home, and I thought that the crowd had separated. Now--" and I paused, listening. "You fancy that you still hear them?" he said, eying me closely and smiling. "Yes; I fear that they are at mischief." "We are afraid of that, too," the smith answered drily, setting his elbows on the table, and looking at me anew. "It is not impossible." Then I understood. I caught Doury's eye--which would fain have escaped mine--and read it there. The hooting of the distant crowd rose more loudly on the summer stillness; as it did so, faces round the table grew graver, lips grew longer, some trembled and looked down; and I understood. "My God!" I cried in excitement, trembling myself. "Is no one going to do anything, then? Are you going to sit here, while these demons work their will? While houses are sacked and women and children----" "Why not?" Buton said curtly. "Why not?" I cried.