“Oh!” replied Gabriel, with bitterness, “there is no danger.  You can easily finish him.  Look! he is broken down with suffering; he has hardly a breath of life left; he will make no resistance.  Do not be afraid!”

The quarryman remained motionless, whilst the crowd, strangely impressed with this incident, approached a little nearer the railing, without daring to come within the gate.

“Strike then!” resumed Gabriel, addressing the quarryman, whilst he pointed to the crowd with a solemn gesture; “there are the judges; you are the executioner.”

“No!” cried the quarryman, drawing back, and turning away his eyes; “I’m not the executioner—­not I!”

The crowd remained silent.  For a few moments, not a word, not a cry, disturbed the stillness of the solemn cathedral.  In a desperate case, Gabriel had acted with a profound knowledge of the human heart.  When the multitude, inflamed with blind rage, rushes with ferocious clamor upon a single victim, and each man strikes his blow, this dreadful species of combined murder appears less horrible to each, because they all share in the common crime; and then the shouts, the sight of blood, the desperate defence of the man they massacre, finish by producing a sort of ferocious intoxication; but, amongst all those furious madmen, who take part in the homicide, select one, and place him face to face with the victim, no longer capable of resistance, and say to him, “Strike!”—­he will hardly ever dare to do so.

It was thus with the quarryman; the wretch trembled at the idea of committing a murder in cold blood, “all alone.”  The preceding scene had passed very rapidly; amongst the companions of the quarryman, nearest to the railing, some did not understand an impression, which they would themselves have felt as strongly as this bold man, if it had been said to them:  “Do the office of executioner!” These, therefore, began to murmur aloud at his weakness.  “He dares not finish the poisoner,” said one.

“The coward!”

“He is afraid.”

“He draws back.”  Hearing these words, the quarryman ran to the gate, threw it wide open, and, pointing to Father d’Aigrigny, exclaimed:  “If there is one here braver than I am, let him go and finish the job—­let him be, the executioner—­come!”

On this proposal the murmurs ceased.  A deep silence reigned once more in the cathedral.  All those countenances, but now so furious, became sad, confused, almost frightened.

The deluded mob began to appreciate the ferocious cowardice of the action it had been about to commit.  Not one durst go alone to strike the half expiring man.  Suddenly, Father d’Aigrigny uttered a dying rattle, his head and one of his arms stirred with a convulsive movement, and then fell back upon the stones as if he had just expired.

Gabriel uttered a cry of anguish, and threw himself on his knees close to Father d’Aigrigny, exclaiming:  “Great Heaven! he is dead!”