Montmartre--loomed threateningly in the fast-gathering dusk of this
winter's afternoon. Men in ragged red shirts, their unkempt heads
crowned with Phrygian caps adorned with a tricolour cockade, lounged
against the wall, or sat in groups on the top of piles of refuse that
littered the street, with a rough deal plank between them and a greasy
pack of cards in their grimy fingers. Guns and bayonets were propped
against the wall. The gate itself had three means of egress; each of
these was guarded by two men with fixed bayonets at their shoulders, but
otherwise dressed like the others, in rags--with bare legs that looked
blue and numb in the cold--the sans-culottes of revolutionary Paris.

Bibot rose from his seat, nodding to Marat, and joined his men.

From afar, but gradually drawing nearer, came the sound of a ribald
song, with chorus accompaniment sung by throats obviously surfeited with
liquor.

For a moment--as the sound approached--Bibot turned back once more to
the Friend of the People.

"Am I to understand, citizen," he said, "that my orders are not to let
anyone pass through these gates to-night?"

"No, no, citizen," replied Marat, "we dare not do that. There are a
number of good patriots in the city still. We cannot interfere with
their liberty or--"

And the look of fear of the demagogue--himself afraid of the human
whirlpool which he has let loose--stole into Marat's cruel, piercing
eyes.