The Rising Storm by Dennis Wheatley

Author:Dennis Wheatley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 1972-11-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter XV

The Assassins

The upheavals that had shaken France only two months earlier were of such magnitude that Roger expected many signs of their repercussion to be visible in so large a city as Le Havre; so he was somewhat surprised to find that, apart from the new uniforms of the National Guard, there was little overt evidence to show that the Revolution had ever taken place. The town was orderly and people going about their business in a normal fashion.

There being nothing to detain him there, next morning he bought a bay mare with a white star on her forehead, and set out for Paris. Inland, just as in the Pas de Calais, here and there the blackened walls of roofless châteaux told their horrifying tale; but others that had escaped the holocaust still dignified the countryside, and within sight of them the peasants were placidly working in the fields as they had for generations.

Paris, too, showed little outward change, except that fewer private equipages with footmen in attendance were to be seen in the streets than formerly; so it seemed at first sight that France had come through the birth-pangs of her regeneration surprisingly quickly.

But Roger soon learned that all was far from well beneath the surface. At La Belle Êtoile, his landlord answered an enquiry as to how he did with a glum shake of the head. Business had never been so bad as during the past month. Every man now considered himself as good as his master, which was foolish because the world could not go on that way; and what good did it do anyone to assume such superior airs if it brought no money into their pockets? The workpeople now had to be asked to do every little thing instead of accepting an order, and they did it or not as they felt inclined. Most of them idled away half the day, but they expected their wages just the same at the end of the week. In fact they were demanding more. In that Monsieur Blanchard would have sympathised with them, had they been willing to do an honest day’s work; as corn was still terribly scarce and the cost of living higher than ever. But one could not pay people higher wages when one’s own takings had fallen by more than 50 per cent. That stood to reason. Where all the money had gone he did not know. It was said that the thousands of aristocrats who had emigrated at the beginning of August had taken it all with them. There might be some truth in that. It was certainly no longer in Paris.

Wherever Roger went he heard the same gloomy story, and he soon became aware of the reason that lay behind it. On the 4th of August an extraordinary scene had taken place in the National Assembly. A report on the disorders in the Provinces had been presented the previous day and the deputies were considering how to produce some measure which would appease the fury of the peasants.

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