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Then she resumed her woman's office of intercession; and by it won for herself the title of "the Good Empress." The eyes which first caught sight of the receding ship Heros, at dawn, were those of Paul L'Ouverture and Genifrede. They were left alone, but not altogether forlorn. They called each other father and daughter; and here they could freely, and for ever, mourn Moyse.
Eyes which shone with love of L'Ouverture could not look benignly on those who would have kidnapped or murdered him. Nor did the eleven meet with any visible sympathy from the multitude of their own colour who were present.
La Plume had fallen by bribery; Clerveaux by cajolery; and both means had been attempted with Christophe. The troops were assailed on the side of their best affections. They were told that Leclerc came to do honour to L'Ouverture to thank him for his government of the island during the troubles of France, and to convoy to him the approbation of the First Consul, in papers enclosed in a golden box.
"For shame, Denis?" said Aimee. "You are ridiculing him who first called my father L'Ouverture." "And do you suppose he knew the use that would be made of the word?" asked Genifrede. "If he had foreseen its being a tide, he would have contented himself with the obsequious bows I remember so well, and never have spoken the word." Denis was forthwith bowing, with might and main.
It is said that the pheasants in a Sussex wood awoke and screamed on Sunday night during the barrage fire around London. But this was egotism on the part of the pheasants. The pheasants of Wiltshire did not have their sleep broken, and so were not troubled about the sufferings of Londoners. Wordsworth assured Toussaint L'Ouverture: There's not a breathing of the common air That will forget thee.
Vincent rushed forward, knelt before Toussaint, and clasped his knees, imploring, in a convulsion of grief, pardon for the past, and permission to devote every hour of his future life to the family whom he had ruined. "My pardon you have," said L'Ouverture. "I should rather say my compassion; for you never deliberately designed treachery, I am persuaded." "I never did! I never did!"
I perceive that your friendships among this new race have blinded your eyes, so that you cannot see that these executions are, indeed, God's avenging of the murder by which you are made a second time an orphan." "Do you think L'Ouverture right, then? I should be glad to believe that he was not cruel dreadfully cruel."
Towards the end of April the difficulty became so pressing, that L'Ouverture found himself compelled to give up his plan of defensive war, with all its advantages, and risk much to obtain the indispensable means of carrying on the struggle.
The first relief to the anxious watchers was on seeing the heights gradually cleared at sunrise. The next was the news that L'Ouverture was entering the town, followed by the ringleaders from Limbe, whom he was bringing in as prisoners. He had proceeded directly to the scene of insurrection, where the leaders of the mob were delivered up to him at his first bidding.
"What to do!" said L'Ouverture to Christophe, as they entered his apartment at Le Dondon. "What to do? Everything, this year and for the future, may depend on what we decide on for our next step. And we must decide before we leave this room, say your thoughts, Henri." "I am for a truce." "I am for a retreat in the mountains. Now for our reasons! Why do you desire a truce?"
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