CHAPTER III

THE "SPUN" MAN


This justice must be rendered to the police of that period,
that even in the most serious public junctures, it imperturbably
fulfilled its duties connected with the sewers and surveillance.
A revolt was, in its eyes, no pretext for allowing malefactors
to take the bit in their own mouths, and for neglecting society
for the reason that the government was in peril. The ordinary
service was performed correctly in company with the extraordinary
service, and was not troubled by the latter. In the midst of an
incalculable political event already begun, under the pressure
of a possible revolution, a police agent, "spun" a thief without
allowing himself to be distracted by insurrection and barricades.

It was something precisely parallel which took place on the
afternoon of the 6th of June on the banks of the Seine, on the
slope of the right shore, a little beyond the Pont des Invalides.

There is no longer any bank there now. The aspect of the locality
has changed.

On that bank, two men, separated by a certain distance,
seemed to be watching each other while mutually avoiding
each other. The one who was in advance was trying to get away,
the one in the rear was trying to overtake the other.

It was like a game of checkers played at a distance and in silence.
Neither seemed to be in any hurry, and both walked slowly, as though
each of them feared by too much haste to make his partner redouble
his pace.

One would have said that it was an appetite following its prey,
and purposely without wearing the air of doing so. The prey was
crafty and on its guard.

The proper relations between the hunted pole-cat and the hunting dog
were observed. The one who was seeking to escape had an insignificant
mien and not an impressive appearance; the one who was seeking
to seize him was rude of aspect, and must have been rude to encounter.

The first, conscious that he was the more feeble, avoided the second;
but he avoided him in a manner which was deeply furious; any one
who could have observed him would have discerned in his eyes the
sombre hostility of flight, and all the menace that fear contains.

The shore was deserted; there were no passers-by; not even a boatman
nor a lighter-man was in the skiffs which were moored here and there.

It was not easy to see these two men, except from the quay opposite,
and to any person who had scrutinized them at that distance,
the man who was in advance would have appeared like a bristling,
tattered, and equivocal being, who was uneasy and trembling beneath
a ragged blouse, and the other like a classic and official personage,
wearing the frock-coat of authority buttoned to the chin.

Perchance the reader might recognize these two men, if he were
to see them closer at hand.

What was the object of the second man?

Probably to succeed in clothing the first more warmly.

When a man clothed by the state pursues a man in rags, it is in order
to make of him a man who is also clothed by the state. Only, the whole
question lies in the color. To be dressed in blue is glorious;
to be dressed in red is disagreeable.

There is a purple from below.

It is probably some unpleasantness and some purple of this sort
which the first man is desirous of shirking.

If the other allowed him to walk on, and had not seized him as yet,
it was, judging from all appearances, in the hope of seeing him lead up
to some significant meeting-place and to some group worth catching.
This delicate operation is called "spinning."

What renders this conjecture entirely probable is that the
buttoned-up man, on catching sight from the shore of a hackney-coach
on the quay as it was passing along empty, made a sign to the driver;
the driver understood, evidently recognized the person with whom
he had to deal, turned about and began to follow the two men
at the top of the quay, at a foot-pace. This was not observed
by the slouching and tattered personage who was in advance.

The hackney-coach rolled along the trees of the Champs-Elysees.
The bust of the driver, whip in hand, could be seen moving along
above the parapet.

One of the secret instructions of the police authorities to their
agents contains this article: "Always have on hand a hackney-coach,
in case of emergency."

While these two men were manoeuvring, each on his own side,
with irreproachable strategy, they approached an inclined plane on
the quay which descended to the shore, and which permitted cab-drivers
arriving from Passy to come to the river and water their horses.
This inclined plane was suppressed later on, for the sake of symmetry;
horses may die of thirst, but the eye is gratified.

It is probable that the man in the blouse had intended to ascend
this inclined plane, with a view to making his escape into the
Champs-Elysees, a place ornamented with trees, but, in return,
much infested with policemen, and where the other could easily
exercise violence.

This point on the quay is not very far distant from the house brought
to Paris from Moret in 1824, by Colonel Brack, and designated
as "the house of Francois I." A guard house is situated close at hand.

To the great surprise of his watcher, the man who was being tracked
did not mount by the inclined plane for watering. He continued
to advance along the quay on the shore.

His position was visibly becoming critical.

What was he intending to do, if not to throw himself into the Seine?

Henceforth, there existed no means of ascending to the quay;
there was no other inclined plane, no staircase; and they were near
the spot, marked by the bend in the Seine towards the Pont de Jena,
where the bank, growing constantly narrower, ended in a slender tongue,
and was lost in the water. There he would inevitably find himself
blocked between the perpendicular wall on his right, the river on
his left and in front of him, and the authorities on his heels.

It is true that this termination of the shore was hidden from sight
by a heap of rubbish six or seven feet in height, produced by some
demolition or other. But did this man hope to conceal himself
effectually behind that heap of rubbish, which one need but skirt?
The expedient would have been puerile. He certainly was not
dreaming of such a thing. The innocence of thieves does not extend
to that point.

The pile of rubbish formed a sort of projection at the water's edge,
which was prolonged in a promontory as far as the wall of the quay.

The man who was being followed arrived at this little mound and went
round it, so that he ceased to be seen by the other.

The latter, as he did not see, could not be seen; he took advantage
of this fact to abandon all dissimulation and to walk very rapidly.
In a few moments, he had reached the rubbish heap and passed round it.
There he halted in sheer amazement. The man whom he had been pursuing
was no longer there.

Total eclipse of the man in the blouse.

The shore, beginning with the rubbish heap, was only about thirty
paces long, then it plunged into the water which beat against the
wall of the quay. The fugitive could not have thrown himself into
the Seine without being seen by the man who was following him.
What had become of him?

The man in the buttoned-up coat walked to the extremity of the shore,
and remained there in thought for a moment, his fists clenched,
his eyes searching. All at once he smote his brow. He had
just perceived, at the point where the land came to an end and the
water began, a large iron grating, low, arched, garnished with a
heavy lock and with three massive hinges. This grating, a sort
of door pierced at the base of the quay, opened on the river
as well as on the shore. A blackish stream passed under it.
This stream discharged into the Seine.

Beyond the heavy, rusty iron bars, a sort of dark and vaulted
corridor could be descried. The man folded his arms and stared
at the grating with an air of reproach.

As this gaze did not suffice, he tried to thrust it aside; he shook it,
it resisted solidly. It is probable that it had just been opened,
although no sound had been heard, a singular circumstance in so
rusty a grating; but it is certain that it had been closed again.
This indicated that the man before whom that door had just opened
had not a hook but a key.

This evidence suddenly burst upon the mind of the man who was trying
to move the grating, and evoked from him this indignant ejaculation:

"That is too much! A government key!"

Then, immediately regaining his composure, he expressed a whole
world of interior ideas by this outburst of monosyllables accented
almost ironically: "Come! Come! Come! Come!"

That said, and in the hope of something or other, either that he
should see the man emerge or other men enter, he posted himself on
the watch behind a heap of rubbish, with the patient rage of a pointer.

The hackney-coach, which regulated all its movements on his, had,
in its turn, halted on the quay above him, close to the parapet.
The coachman, foreseeing a prolonged wait, encased his horses'
muzzles in the bag of oats which is damp at the bottom, and which
is so familiar to Parisians, to whom, be it said in parenthesis,
the Government sometimes applies it. The rare passers-by on the Pont
de Jena turned their heads, before they pursued their way, to take
a momentary glance at these two motionless items in the landscape,
the man on the shore, the carriage on the quay.