“Citizens!
This is the example which the old give to the young.
We hesitated, he came!
We were drawing back, he advanced!
This is what those who are trembling with age teach to those who tremble with fear!
This aged man is august in the eyes of his country.
He has had a long life and a magnificent death!
Now, let us place the body under cover, that each one of us may defend this old man dead as he would his father living, and may his presence in our midst render the barricade impregnable!”
A murmur of gloomy and energetic assent followed these words.
Enjolras bent down, raised the old man’s head, and fierce as he was, he kissed him on the brow, then, throwing wide his arms, and handling this dead man with tender precaution, as though he feared to hurt it, he removed his coat, showed the bloody holes in it to all, and said:—
“This is our flag now.”
CHAPTER III—GAVROCHE WOULD HAVE DONE BETTER TO ACCEPT ENJOLRAS’ CARBINE
They threw a long black shawl of Widow Hucheloup’s over Father Mabeuf.
Six men made a litter of their guns; on this they laid the body, and bore it, with bared heads, with solemn slowness, to the large table in the tap-room.
These men, wholly absorbed in the grave and sacred task in which they were engaged, thought no more of the perilous situation in which they stood.
When the corpse passed near Javert, who was still impassive, Enjolras said to the spy:—
“It will be your turn presently!”
During all this time, Little Gavroche, who alone had not quitted his post, but had remained on guard, thought he espied some men stealthily approaching the barricade.
All at once he shouted:—
“Look out!”
Courfeyrac, Enjolras, Jean Prouvaire, Combeferre, Joly, Bahorel, Bossuet, and all the rest ran tumultuously from the wine-shop.
It was almost too late.
They saw a glistening density of bayonets undulating above the barricade.
Municipal guards of lofty stature were making their way in, some striding over the omnibus, others through the cut, thrusting before them the urchin, who retreated, but did not flee.
The moment was critical.
It was that first, redoubtable moment of inundation, when the stream rises to the level of the levee and when the water begins to filter through the fissures of dike.
A second more and the barricade would have been taken.
Bahorel dashed upon the first municipal guard who was entering, and killed him on the spot with a blow from his gun; the second killed Bahorel with a blow from his bayonet.
Another had already overthrown Courfeyrac, who was shouting:
“Follow me!”
The largest of all, a sort of colossus, marched on Gavroche with his bayonet fixed.
The urchin took in his arms Javert’s immense gun, levelled it resolutely at the giant, and fired.
No discharge followed.
Javert’s gun was not loaded.
The municipal guard burst into a laugh and raised his bayonet at the child.
Before the bayonet had touched Gavroche, the gun slipped from the soldier’s grasp, a bullet had struck the municipal guardsman in the centre of the forehead, and he fell over on his back.
A second bullet struck the other guard, who had assaulted Courfeyrac in the breast, and laid him low on the pavement.
This was the work of Marius, who had just entered the barricade.
CHAPTER IV—THE BARREL OF POWDER
Marius, still concealed in the turn of the Rue Mondetour, had witnessed, shuddering and irresolute, the first phase of the combat.
But he had not long been able to resist that mysterious and sovereign vertigo which may be designated as the call of the abyss.
In the presence of the imminence of the peril, in the presence of the death of M. Mabeuf, that melancholy enigma, in the presence of Bahorel killed, and Courfeyrac shouting:
“Follow me!” of that child threatened, of his friends to succor or to avenge, all hesitation had vanished, and he had flung himself into the conflict, his two pistols in hand.
With his first shot he had saved Gavroche, and with the second delivered Courfeyrac.
Amid the sound of the shots, amid the cries of the assaulted guards, the assailants had climbed the entrenchment, on whose summit Municipal Guards, soldiers of the line and National Guards from the suburbs could now be seen, gun in hand, rearing themselves to more than half the height of their bodies.
They already covered more than two-thirds of the barrier, but they did not leap into the enclosure, as though wavering in the fear of some trap.
They gazed into the dark barricade as one would gaze into a lion’s den.
The light of the torch illuminated only their bayonets, their bear-skin caps, and the upper part of their uneasy and angry faces.
Marius had no longer any weapons; he had flung away his discharged pistols after firing them; but he had caught sight of the barrel of powder in the tap-room, near the door.
As he turned half round, gazing in that direction, a soldier took aim at him.