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Any good citizen of Paris, arising belated, if any such there may have been, and hurrying to the walls to know how things went for the king's cause, would have recognized readily enough in these two strange opposites two of the most dreaded of the myrmidons of Tristan l'Hermite, no less than his two chief hangmen, Trois-Echelles and Petit-Jean.
"All Paris is on the walls watching the battle. Lucky Paris!" Trois-Echelles laughed ill-humoredly. "Not so lucky if we don't win the battle." Petit-Jean was complacent. "Whichever wins will need us to hang the losers. Look at the bright side, man." Trois-Echelles fumbled his beads furtively. "I've lost heart, I tell you. I haven't hanged a man for a week."
Trois-Echelles, making gestures of protestation with his head but taking the bottle with his hand none the less, drew a deep draught from its throttle and sighed as sadly as his friend sighed gladly. "I will drink but I cannot be merry. What's the good of building a noble gallows if nobody looks at it? One might as well be building a church." Petit-Jean laughed good-naturedly.
Sometimes, however, as in the affair of the assassins of Petit-Jean, the headsman of Paris, and in that of Emery Rousseau, the murderer of Jean Valleret, justice overleaped the church and passed on to the execution of its sentences; but unless by virtue of a decree of Parliament, woe to him who violated a place of asylum with armed force!
The ladies and gentlemen of the court ranged themselves in their places behind the royal pair and the Scottish archers formed a solid force in front. Through the open gateway came a few running, shouting enthusiasts, outstrippers of the mass of citizens who were returning from the walls. Even the heavy sleep of Trois-Echelles and Petit-Jean was not proof against all this tumult.
Trois-Echelles was the long, cadaverous hangman; Petit-Jean was the stout, droll hangman, but when it came to a push and a pinch, both were hangmen and hung in the same manner, if not with the same manners.
As he mourned over this melancholy retrospect, the door of a little house hard by the church opened and an old woman, propping herself on a crutch stick, came hobbling slowly across the open space towards the church. Petit-Jean knew her well enough, for they both lodged in the same house and both on the same floor of attics.
The great Republican General started upon his campaign in the Low Countries as fully satisfied as under the circumstances he could hope to be. Malus and Petit-Jean were not only enlarged but reinstated, he was promised abundant supplies of all descriptions, and he was assured that the Republic approved and endorsed his plan of campaign.
Meanwhile, at Chantonney, representative Bourdon de l'Oise drinks with General Tunck, becomes "frantic" when tipsy, and has patriotic administrators seized in their beds at midnight, whom he had embraced the evening before. Nearly all of them, like the latter, get nasty after a few drinks, Carrier at Nantes, Petit-Jean at Thiers, Duquesnoy at Arras, Cusset at Thionville, Monestier at Tarbes.
"They say he is banished, but he has sent me money, bless him! though I touch none of it, lest it be badly come by." Trois-Echelles stopped fumbling his beads and advanced towards her, extending his hand. "Give it to me to spend on masses?" he asked sanctimoniously. Petit-Jean danced between them. "Lend it to me for drink money," he urged. The old woman paid no heed to their proposals.
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