3.V.3.3. 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 passersby; 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 passersby 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.