AN ENDEAVOR TO CONSOLE THE WIDOW HUCHELOUP.
Bahorel, delighted with the barricade, exclaimed, "How well the street looks décolleté!"
Courfeyrac, while gradually demolishing the public-house, tried to console the widowed landlady.
"Mother Hucheloup, were you not complaining the other day that you had been summoned by the police, because Gibelotte shook a counterpane out of the window?"
"Yes, my good Monsieur Courfeyrac. Ah! good gracious! are you going to put that table too in your horror? Yes, and the Government also condemned me to a fine of one hundred francs on account of a flower-pot that fell out of the garret into the street. Is that not abominable?"
"Well, Mother Hucheloup, we are going to avenge you."
Mother Hucheloup did not exactly see the advantage accruing to her from the reparation made her. She was satisfied after the fashion of the Arab woman who, having received a box on the ears from her husband, went to complain to her father, crying vengeance, and saying, "Father, you owe my husband affront for affront." The father asked, "On which cheek did you receive the blow?" "On the left cheek." The father boxed her right cheek, and said, "Now you must be satisfied. Go and tell your husband that he buffeted my daughter, but I have buffeted his wife." The rain had ceased, and recruits began to arrive. Artisans brought under their blouses a barrel of gunpowder, a hamper containing carboys of vitriol, two or three carnival torches, and a basket full of lamps, "remaining from the king's birthday," which was quite recent, as it was celebrated on May 1. It was said that this ammunition was sent by a grocer in the Faubourg St. Antoine named Pépin. The only lantern in the Rue de la Chanvrerie, and all those in the surrounding streets, were broken. Enjolras, Combeferre, and Courfeyrac directed everything, and now two barricades were erected simultaneously, both of which were supported by Corinth and formed a square; the larger one closed the Rue de la Chanvrerie, and the smaller the Rue Mondétour on the side of the Rue du Cygne. This latter barricade, which was very narrow, was merely made of barrels and paving-stones. There were about fifty workmen there, of whom three were armed with guns, for on the road they had borrowed a gunsmith's entire stock.
Nothing could be stranger or more motley than this group: one had a sleeved waistcoat, a cavalry sabre, and a pair of holster pistols; another was in shirt-sleeves, with a round hat, and a powder-flask hung at his side; while a third was cuirassed with nine sheets of gray paper, and was armed with a saddler's awl. There was one who shouted, "Let us exterminate to the last, and die on the point of our bayonet!" This man had no bayonet. Another displayed over his coat the belts and pouch of a National Guard, with these words sewn in red worsted on the cover, "Public order." There were many muskets, bearing the numbers of legions, few hats, no neckties, a great many bare arms, and a few pikes; add to this all ages, all faces, short pale youths, and bronzed laborers at the docks. All were in a hurry, and while assisting each other, talked about the possible chances,—that they were sure of one regiment, and Paris would rise. There were terrible remarks, with which a sort of cordial joviality was mingled; they might have been taken for brothers, though they did not know one another's names. Great dangers have this beauty about them, that they throw light on the fraternity of strangers.
A fire was lighted in the kitchen, and men were melting in a bullet-mould, bowls, spoons, forks, and all the pewter articles of the public-house. They drank while doing this, and caps and slugs lay pell-mell on the table with glasses of wine. In the billiard-room Mame Hucheloup, Matelote, and Gibelotte, variously affected by terror,—as one was brutalized by it, another had her breath stopped, while the third was awakened,—were tearing up old sheets and making lint; three insurgents helped them,—three hairy, bearded, and moustached fellows, who pulled the linen asunder with the fingers of a sempstress and made them tremble. The tall man, whom Courfeyrac, Combeferre, and Enjolras had noticed as he joined the band at the corner of the Rue des Billetes, was working at the small barricade and making himself useful; Gavroche was working at the large one; and as for the young man who had waited for Courfeyrac at his lodgings and asked after M. Marius, he disappeared just about the time when the omnibus was overthrown.
Gavroche, who was perfectly radiant, had taken the arrangements on himself; he came, went, ascended, descended, went up again, rustled and sparkled. He seemed to be there for the encouragement of all. Had he a spur? Certainly, in his misery. Had he wings? Certainly, in his joy. Gavroche was a whirlwind; he was seen incessantly, and constantly heard, and he filled the air, being everywhere at once. He was a sort of almost irritating ubiquity, and it was impossible to stop with him. The enormous barricade felt him on its crupper; he annoyed the idlers, excited the slothful, reanimated the fatigued, vexed the thoughtful, rendered some gay and gave others time to breathe, set some in a passion and all in motion; he piqued a student and stung a workman; he halted, then started again, flew over the turmoil and the efforts, leaped from one to the other, murmured, buzzed, and harassed the whole team; he was the fly of the immense revolutionary coach. Perpetual movement was in his little arms, and perpetual clamor in his little lungs.
"Push ahead; more paving-stones, more barrels, more vehicles! Where are there any? We want a hodload of plaster to stop up this hole. Your barricade is very small, and must mount. Put everything into it; smash up the house; a barricade is Mother Gibou's tea. Hilloh! there's a glass door."
This made the workmen exclaim,—
"A glass door! What would you have us do with that, tubercule?"
"Hercules yourselves," Gavroche retorted; "a glass door in a barricade is excellent, for though it does not prevent the attack, it makes it awkward to take it. Have you never boned apples over a wall on which there was broken glass? A glass door cuts the corns of the National Guards when they try to climb up the barricade. By Job! glass is treacherous. Well, you fellows have no very bright imagination."
He was furious with his useless pistol, and went from one to the other, saying, "A gun! I want a gun! Why don't you give me a gun?"
"A gun for you?" said Combeferre.
"Well, why not?" Gavroche answered; "I had one in 1830, when we quarrelled with Charles X."
Enjolras shrugged his shoulders.
"When all the men have guns we will give them to boys."
Gavroche turned firmly, and answered him,—
"If you are killed before me I will take yours."
"Gamin!" said Enjolras.
"Puppy!" said Gavroche.
A dandy lounging past the end of the street created a diversion; Gavroche shouted to him,—
"Come to us, young man! What, will you do nothing for your old country?"
The dandy fled.