Foot to Foot — Les Misérables

When there were no longer any of the leaders left alive, except Enjolras and Marius at the two extremities, the centre, which had so long sustained Courfeyrac, Joly, Bossuet, Feuilly and Combeferre, gave way. The cannon had made a hollow in the middle. The exterior slope presented an inclined plane to the attack. A final assault was there attempted, and this assault succeeded. The group defending the centre retreated in confusion. Then the gloomy love of life awoke once more in some of them. They were hemmed in by the lofty house that formed the background. They set to knocking at that door with the butts of their guns, shouting, calling, entreating, wringing their hands. No one opened. From the little window on the third floor, the head of the dead man gazed down upon them.

Enjolras and Marius, and the seven or eight rallied about them, sprang forward and protected them. Enjolras shouted to the soldiers: Don't advance. And as an officer had not obeyed, Enjolras had killed the officer. He was now in the little inner court, his back against the Corinthe building, a sword in one hand, a rifle in the other, holding open the door of the wine-shop. There is but one door open. This one. Shielding them with his body, facing an entire battalion alone, he made them pass in behind him. He was the last to enter. The door was slammed with such violence that it showed the five fingers of a soldier who had been clinging to it, cut off and glued to the post. Marius remained outside. A shot had just broken his collar bone. He felt that he was fainting. With eyes already shut, he felt a vigorous hand seizing him, and he had time for the thought, mingled with a last memory of Cosette: I am taken prisoner. I shall be shot.

Enjolras, not seeing Marius among those who had taken refuge, had the same idea. But each man had not the time to meditate on his own death. He barred the door, bolted it, and double-locked it with key and chain, while those outside battered at it. The siege of the wine-shop was now beginning. When the door was barricaded, Enjolras said: Let us sell our lives dearly. Then he approached the table on which lay the old warden and Gavroche. A hand projected from beneath the winding sheet. It was that of the old man. Enjolras bent down and kissed that venerable hand. These were the only two kisses which he had bestowed in the course of his life. The wine-shop fought like a house that will not yield. When the door yielded, the assailants found not a single combatant there. The spiral staircase, hewn asunder with the axe, lay in the middle of the tap-room. Every one who was not killed was on the first floor, and from the hole in the ceiling a terrific fire burst forth. It was the last of their cartridges. When they were exhausted, each grasped two of the bottles Enjolras had reserved. They were bottles of aquafortis. The rim of the hole in the ceiling was speedily surrounded by heads of the slain. There were no longer men in this conflict. Demons attacked, spectres resisted. It was heroism become monstrous.