Hunchback of Notre Dame (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) (7 page)

Master Andry raised his eyes, seemed for a moment to be measuring the height of the column, the weight of the rascal, mentally multiplied that weight by the square of the velocity, and was silent.

Jehan, master of the field of battle, went on triumphantly:—

“I’d do it, though I am the brother of an arch-deacon!”

“Fine fellows, our University men are, not even to have insisted upon our rights on such a day as this! For, only think of it, there is a Maypole and a bonfire in the Town; a miracle play, the Pope of Fools, and Flemish ambassadors in the City; and at the University—nothing!”

“And yet Maubert Square is big enough!” answered one of the scholars established on the window-seat.

“Down with the rector, the electors, and the proctors!” shouted Joannes.

“We must build a bonfire tonight in the Gaillard Field,” went on the other, “with Master Andry’s books.”

“And the desks of the scribes,” said his neighbor.

“And the beadles’ wands!”

“And the deans’ spittoons!”

“And the proctors’ cupboards!”

“And the electors’ bread-bins!”

“And the rector’s footstools!”

“Down with them!” went on little Jehan, mimicking a droning psalm-tune; “down with Master Andry, the beadles, and the scribes; down with theologians, doctors, and decretists; proctors, electors, and rector!”

“Is the world coming to an end?” muttered Master Andry, stopping his ears as he spoke.

“Speaking of the rector, there he goes through the square!” shouted one of those in the window.

Every one turned towards the square.

“Is it really our respectable rector, Master Thibaut?” asked Jehan Frollo du Moulin, who, clinging to one of the inner columns, could see nothing of what was going on outside.

“Yes, yes,” replied the rest with one accord, “it is really he, Master Thibaut, the rector.”

It was indeed the rector and all the dignitaries of the University going in procession to meet the ambassadors, and just at this moment crossing the Palace yard. The scholars, crowding in the window, greeted them, as they passed, with sarcasms and mock applause. The rector, who walked at the head of his company, received the first volley, which was severe:—

“Good-morning, Sir Rector! Hello there! Good-morning, I say!”

“How does he happen to be here, the old gambler? Has he forsaken his dice?”

“How he ambles along on his mule! The animal’s ears are not as long as his own.”

“Hello there! Good-day to you, Master Rector Thibaut!
Tybalde aleator!
^f
old fool! old gambler!”

“God keep you! did you throw many double sixes last night?”

“Oh, look at his lead-colored old face, wrinkled and worn with love of cards and dice!”

“Whither away so fast, Thibaut,
Tybalde ad dados
,
^g
turning your back on the University and trotting straight towards town?”

“He’s probably going to look for a lodging in Tybaldice Street,” shouted Jehan du Moulin.

The entire band repeated the silly joke in a shout like thunder, and with frantic clapping of hands.

“You’re going to look for a lodging in Tybaldice Street, are you not, Sir Rector, you devil’s advocate?”

Then came the turn of the other officials.

“Down with the beadles! down with the mace-bearers!”

“Say, you Robin Poussepain, who’s that fellow yonder?”

“That’s Gilbert de Suilly,
Gilbertus de Soliaco,
Chancellor of the College of Autun.”

“Here’s my shoe; you’ve got a better place than I; fling it in his face.”

“
Saturnalitias mittimus ecce nuces
.”
^h

“Down with the six theologians in the white surplices!”

“Are those theologians? I thought they were six white geese given to the city by Saint Geneviève for the fief of Roogny.”

“Down with the doctors!”

“Down with all the pompous and jocose disputations.”

“Take my cap, Chancellor of St. Geneviève! You did me an injustice,—and that’s the truth; he gave my place in the nation of Normandy to little Ascanio Falzaspada, who belongs to the province of Bourges, being an Italian.”

“Rank injustice,” exclaimed all the students. “Down with the Chancellor of St. Geneviève.”

“Ho there, Master Joachim de Ladehors! Ho there, Louis Dahuille! Hollo, Lambert Hoctement!”

“May the devil smother the proctor of the German nation!”

“And the chaplains of the Holy Chapel, with their grey amices,
cum tunicis grisis!
”

“Ho there! you Masters of Arts! See all the fine black copes! See all the fine red copes!”

“That makes a fine tail for the rector!”

“You would think it was a Venetian doge on his way to wed the sea.”

“I say, Jehan! look at the Canons of St. Geneviève!”

“To the devil with all Canons!”

“Abbot Claude Choart! Doctor Claude Choart! Are you looking for Marie la Giffarde?”

“She lives in Glatigny Street.”

“She’s bedmaker to the king of scamps.”

“She’s paying her four farthings,
quatuor denarios
.”

“Would you like her to pay you in the nose?”

“Comrades! there goes Master Simon Sanguin the Elector from Picardy, with his wife behind him!”

“Post equitem sedet atra cura.
”
^k

“Cheer up, Master Simon!”

“Good-day to you, Sir Elector!”

“Good-night to you, Madame Electress!”

“How lucky they are to see so much!” sighed Joannes de Molendino, still perched among the foliage of his column.

Meanwhile, the licensed copyist to the University, Master Andry Musnier, leaned towards the ear of the furrier of the king’s robes, Master Gilles Lecornu.

“I tell you, sir, this is the end of the world. The students never were so riotous before; it’s the cursed inventions of the age that are ruining us all,—artillery, bombards, serpentines, and particularly printing, that other German pestilence. No more manuscripts, no more books! Printing is death to bookselling. The end of the world is at hand.”

“So I see by the rage for velvet stuffs,” said the furrier.

At this instant the clock struck twelve.

“Ha!” cried the entire throng with but a single voice.

The students were silent. Then began a great stir; a great moving of feet and heads; a general outbreak of coughing and handkerchiefs; everybody shook himself, arranged himself, raised himself on tiptoe, placed himself to the best advantage. Then came deep silence; every neck was stretched, every mouth was opened wide, every eye was turned towards the marble table. Nothing was to be seen there. The four officers still stood stiff and motionless as four coloured statues. Every eye turned towards the dais reserved for the Flemish ambassadors. The door was still shut and the dais empty. The throng has been waiting since dawn for three things: noon, the Flemish ambassadors, and the mystery. Noon alone arrived punctually.

Really it was too bad.

They waited one, two, three, five minutes, a quarter of an hour; nothing happened. The dais was still deserted, the theater mute. Rage followed in the footsteps of impatience. Angry words passed from mouth to mouth, though still in undertones, to be sure. “The mystery! the mystery!” was the low cry.

Every head was in a ferment. A tempest, as yet but threatening, hung over the multitude. Jehan du Moulin drew forth the first flash.

“The mystery! and to the devil with the Flemish!” he shouted at the top of his voice, writhing and twisting around his capital like a serpent.

The crowd applauded.

“The mystery!” repeated the mob; “and to the devil with all Flanders!”

“We insist on the mystery at once,” continued the student; “or else it’s my advice to hang the Palace bailiff by way of a comedy and morality.”

“Well said,” cried the people; “and let us begin the hanging with his men.”

Loud cheers followed. The four poor devils began to turn pale and to exchange glances. The mob surged towards them, and the frail wooden railing parting them from the multitude bent and swayed beneath the pressure.

It was a critical moment.

“Down with them! Down with them!” was the cry from every side.

At that instant the hangings of the dressing-room, which we have already described, were raised, giving passage to a personage the mere sight of whom suddenly arrested the mob, changing rage to curiosity as if by magic.

“Silence! Silence!”

This person, but little reassured, and trembling in every limb, advanced to the edge of the table, with many bows, which, in proportion as he approached, grew more and more like genuflections. However, peace was gradually restored. There remained only that slight murmur always arising from the silence of a vast multitude.

“Sir citizens,” said he, “and fair citizenesses, we shall have the honor to declaim and perform before his Eminence the Cardinal a very fine morality entitled, ‘The Wise Decision of Mistress Virgin Mary.’ I am to enact Jupiter. His Eminence is at this moment es corting the very honorable ambassadors of his Highness the Duke of Austria, which is just now detained to listen to the speech of the Rector of the University at the Donkeys’ Gate. As soon as the most eminent Cardinal arrives, we will begin.”

It is plain that it required nothing less than the intervention of Jupiter himself to save the poor unfortunate officers of the bailiff. If we had had the good luck to invent this very truthful history, and consequently to be responsible for it to our lady of Criticism, the classic rule,
Nec deus intersit
,
^l
could not be brought up against us at this point. Moreover, Lord Jupiter’s costume was very handsome, and contributed not a little to calm the mob by attracting its entire attention. Jupiter was clad in a brigandine covered with black velvet, with gilt nails; on his head was a flat cap trimmed with silver-gilt buttons; and had it not been for the paint and the big beard which covered each a half of his face, had it not been for the roll of gilded cardboard, sprinkled with spangles and all bristling with shreds of tinsel, which he carried in his hand, and in which experienced eyes readily recognized the thunder, had it not been for his flesh-colored feet bound with ribbons in Greek fashion, he might have sustained a comparison for his severity of bearing with any Breton archer in the Duke of Berry’s regiment.

B
ut as he spoke, the satisfaction, the admiration excited by his dress, were destroyed by his words; and when he reached the fatal conclusion, “as soon as the most eminent Cardinal arrives, we will begin,” his voice was drowned in a storm of hoots.

“Begin at once! The mystery! the mystery at once!” screamed the people. And over all the other voices was heard that of Joannes de Molendino piercing the uproar, like the fife in a
charivari
at Nimes. “Begin at once!” shrieked the student.

“Down with Jupiter and Cardinal Bourbon!” shouted Robin Poussepain and the other learned youths perched in the window.

“The morality this instant!” repeated the mob; “instantly! immediately! The sack and the rope for the actors and the Cardinal!”

Poor Jupiter, haggard, terrified, pale beneath his paint, let his thunderbolt fall, and seized his cap in his hand. Then he bowed, trembled, and stammered out: “His Eminence—the ambassadors—Madame Margaret of Flanders—” He knew not what to say. In his secret heart he was mightily afraid of being hanged.

Hanged by the populace for waiting, hanged by the Cardinal for not waiting,—on either hand he saw a gulf; that is to say, the gallows.

Luckily, some one appeared to extricate him from his embarrassing position and assume the responsibility.

An individual, standing just within the railing, in the vacant space about the marble table, and whom nobody had as yet observed,—so completely was his long slim person hidden from sight by the thickness of the pillar against which he leaned,—this individual, we say, tall, thin, pale, fair-haired, still young, although already wrinkled in brow and cheeks, with bright eyes and a smiling mouth, clad in black serge, worn and shining with age, approached the table and made a sign to the poor victim. But the latter, in his terror and confusion, failed to see him.

The newcomer took another step forward.

“Jupiter!” said he, “my dear Jupiter!”

The other did not hear him.

At last the tall fair-haired fellow, growing impatient, shouted almost in his ear,—

“Michel Giborne!”

“Who calls me?” said Jupiter, as if suddenly wakened.

“I,” replied the person dressed in black.

“Ah!” said Jupiter.

“Begin directly,” continued the other. “Satisfy the public; I take it upon myself to pacify the Provost, who will pacify the Cardinal.”

Jupiter breathed again.

“Gentlemen and citizens,” he shouted at the top of his lungs to the crowd who continued to hoot him, “we will begin at once.”

“Evoe, Jupiter! Plaudite, cives!”
^m
cried the students.

“Noël! Noël!”
ⁿ
cried the people.

Deafening applause followed, and the hall still trembled with acclamations when Jupiter had retired behind the hangings.

But the unknown person who had so miraculously changed “the tempest to a calm,” as our dear old Corneille says, had modestly withdrawn into the shadow of his pillar, and would doubtless have remained there invisible, motionless, and mute as before, had he not been drawn forward by two young women, who, placed in the foremost rank of the spectators, had observed his colloquy with Michel Giborne-Jupiter.