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That voice, although accentuated by menace, recalled to him another voice, which, that very morning, had dealt the deathblow to his mystery, by drawling, nasally, in the midst of the audience, "Charity, please!" He raised his head. It was indeed Clopin Trouillefou. Clopin Trouillefou, arrayed in his royal insignia, wore neither one rag more nor one rag less.
Teniers could have given but a very imperfect idea of it. Let the reader picture to himself in bacchanal form, Salvator Rosa's battle. There were no longer either scholars or ambassadors or bourgeois or men or women; there was no longer any Clopin Trouillefou, nor Gilles Lecornu, nor Marie Quatrelivres, nor Robin Poussepain. All was universal license.
Then the husbands thought of theft; the wives, of rape; and all trembled. "To the sack!" repeated the thieves' crew; but they dared not approach. They stared at the beam, they stared at the church. The beam did not stir, the edifice preserved its calm and deserted air; but something chilled the outcasts. "To work, locksmiths!" shouted Trouillefou. "Let the door be forced!" No one took a step.
"To you, Louis de Beaumont, bishop of Paris, counsellor in the Court of Parliament, I, Clopin Trouillefou, king of Thunes, grand Coesre, prince of Argot, bishop of fools, I say: Our sister, falsely condemned for magic, hath taken refuge in your church, you owe her asylum and safety.
"Now," resumed Clopin Trouillefou, "as soon as I clap my hands, you, Andry the Red, will fling the stool to the ground with a blow of your knee; you, Francois Chante-Prune, will cling to the feet of the rascal; and you, Bellevigne, will fling yourself on his shoulders; and all three at once, do you hear?" Gringoire shuddered.
The prologue stopped short, and all heads turned tumultuously towards the beggar, who, far from being disconcerted by this, saw, in this incident, a good opportunity for reaping his harvest, and who began to whine in a doleful way, half closing his eyes the while, "Charity, please!" "Well upon my soul," resumed Joannes, "it's Clopin Trouillefou!
He advanced thus into the very thickest of the cavalry, with the tranquil slowness, the lolling of the head and the regular breathing of a harvester attacking a field of wheat. It was Chopin Trouillefou. A shot from an arquebus laid him low. In the meantime, windows had been opened again.
"Malediction!" he cried as he fell, and remained as though dead, with his face to the earth. Meanwhile, he heard the dreadful peal above his head, the diabolical laughter of the vagabonds, and the voice of Trouillefou saying, "Pick me up that knave, and hang him without ceremony." He rose. They had already detached the manikin to make room for him.
* And by the blood of God, I have neither faith nor law, nor fire nor dwelling-place, nor king nor God. In the meantime, Clopin Trouillefou had finished the distribution of arms. He approached Gringoire, who appeared to be plunged in a profound revery, with his feet on an andiron. "Friend Pierre," said the King of Thunes, "what the devil are you thinking about?"
"And the sacristy, where there are wagon-loads of gold!" added a vagabond, whose name, we regret to say, we do not know. "Beard of Mahom!" cried Trouillefou. "Let us make another trial," resumed the vagabond. Mathias Hungadi shook his head. "We shall never get in by the door. We must find the defect in the armor of the old fairy; a hole, a false postern, some joint or other."
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