THE MAN OF THE PEOPLE.
The room was crammed with strangers and National Guards whom curiosity had drawn into it.
The Queen was therefore checked in her first impulse which was to rush to the new arrival, sponge away the blood with her handkerchief and address him some of the comforting words which spring from the heart, and therefore go to them.
But she could not help rising a little on her seat, extend her arms towards him and mutter his Christian name.
Calm and gloomy, he waved his hand to the strangers and in a soft but firm voice, said:
"You will excuse me, but I have business with their Majesties."
The National Guard began to remonstrate that they were there to prevent anybody talking with the prisoners, but Charny pressed his bloodless lips, frowned, opened his riding coat to show that he carried pistols, and repeated in a voice as gentle as before but twice as menacing:
"Gentlemen, I have already had the honor to tell you that I have private business with the King and the Queen."
At the same time he waved them to go out. On this voice, and the mastery Charny exercised over others, Damas and the two bodyguards resumed their energy, temporarily impaired, and cleared the room by driving the gapers and volunteer soldiers before them.
The Queen now comprehended what use this man would have been in the royal carriage instead of Lady Tourzel, whom she had let etiquette impose on them.
Charny glanced round to make sure that only the faithful were at hand, and said as he went nearer Marie Antoinette:
"I am here, my lady. I have some seventy hussars at the town gate. I believe I can depend on them. What do you order me to do?"
"Tell us first what has happened you, my poor Charny?" she said in German.
He made a sign towards Malden whom he knew to understand the speaker's language.
"Alas, not seeing you, we thought you were dead," she went on in French.
"Unhappily, it is not I but my brother who is slain—poor Isidore! but my turn is coming."
"Charny, I ask you what happened and how you came to keep so long out of the way?" continued the Queen. "You were a defaulter, George, especially to me," she added in German and in a lower voice.
"I thought my brother would account for my temporary absence," he said, bowing.
"Yes, I know: to pursue that wretch of a man, Drouet, and we feared for awhile that you had come to disaster, in that chase."
"A great misfortune did befall me, for despite all my efforts, I could not catch up with him. A postboy returning let him know that your carriage had taken the Varennes Road when he was thinking it had gone to Verdun: he turned into the woods where I pulled my pistols on him but they were not loaded—I had taken Dandoins' horse and not the one prepared for me. It was fatality, and who could help it? I pursued him none the less through the forest but I only knew the roads, so that I was thrown by my horse falling into a ditch! In the darkness I was but hunting a shadow, and he knew it in every hollow. Thus I was left alone in the night, cursing with rage."
She offered her hand to him and he touched it with his tremulous lips.
"Nobody replied to my calls. All night long I wandered and only at daybreak came out at a village on the road from Varennes to Dun. As it was possible that you had escaped Drouet as he escaped me, it was then useless for me to go to Varennes; yet but as he might have had you stopped there, and I was but one man and my devotion was useless, I determined to go on to Dun.
"Before I arrived I met Captain Deslon with a hundred hussars. He was fretting in the absence of news: he had seen Bouille and Raigecourt racing by towards Stenay, but they had said nothing to him, probably from some distrust. But I know Deslon to be a loyal gentleman; I guessed that your Majesty had been detained at Varennes, and that Bouille and his companion had taken flight to get help. I told Deslon all, adjured him to follow me with his cavalry, which he did, but leaving thirty to guard the Meuse Bridge.
"An hour after we were at Varennes, four leagues in an hour, where I wanted to charge and upset everything between us and your Majesty: but we found breastworks inside of works; and to try to ride over them was folly. So I tried parleying: a post of the National Guards being there, I asked leave to join my hussars with those inside but it was refused me: I asked to be allowed to get the King's orders direct and as that was about to be refused likewise. I spurred my steed, jumped two barricades and guided by the tumult, galloped up to this spot just when my bro—your Majesty fell back from the balcony. Now, I await your orders," he concluded.
The Queen pressed his hand in both hers.
"Sire," she said to the King, still plunged in torpor; "have you heard what this faithful servitor is saying?"
The King gave no answer and she went over to him.
"Sire, there is no time to lose, and indeed too much has been lost. Here is Lord Charny with seventy men, sure, he says, and he wants your orders."
He shook his head, though Charny implored him with a glance and the Queen by her voice.
"Orders? I have none to give, being a prisoner. Do whatever you like."
"Good, that is all we want," said the Queen: "you have a blank warrant, you see," she added to her follower whom she took aside: "Do as the King says, whatever you see fit." In a lower voice she appended: "Do it swiftly, and with vigor, or else we are lost!"
"Very well," returned the Lifeguards officer, "let me confer a moment with these gentlemen and we will carry out what we determine immediately."
Choiseul entered, carrying some letters wrapped in a bloodstained handkerchief. He offered this to Charny without a word. The count understood that it came from his brother and putting out his hand to receive the tragic inheritance, he kissed the wrapper. The Queen could not hold back a sigh.
But Charny did not turn round to her, but said as he thrust the packet into his breast:
"Gentlemen, can you aid me in the last effort I intend?"
"We are ready for anything."
"Do you believe we are a dozen men staunch and able?"
"We are eight or nine, any way."
"Well, I will return to my hussars. While I attack the barriers in front, you storm them in the rear. By favor of your diversion, I will force through, and with our united forces we will reach this spot where we will extricate the King."
They held out their hands to him by way of answer.
"In an hour," said Charny to the King and Queen, "you shall be free, or I dead."
"Oh, count, do not say that word," said she, "it causes me too much pain."
George bowed in confirmation of his vow, and stepped towards the door without being appalled by the fresh uproar in the street.
But as he laid his hand on the knob, it flew open and gave admission to a new character who mingled directly in the already complicated plot of the drama.
This was a man in his fortieth year; his countenance was dark and forbidding; his collar open at the throat, his unbuttoned coat, the dust on his clothes, and his eyes red with fatigue, all indicated that he had ridden far and fast under the goad of fierce feeling.
He carried a brace of pistols in his sash girdle and a sabre hung by his side.
Almost breathless as he opened the door, he appeared relieved only when he saw the Royal Family. A smile of vengeance flittered over his face and without troubling about the other persons around the room and by the doorway itself, which he almost blocked up with his massive form, he thundered as he stretched out his hand:
"In the name of the National Assembly, you are all my prisoners!"
As swift as thought Choiseul sprang forward with a pistol in hand and offered to blow out the brains of this intruder, who seemed to surpass in insolence and resolution all they had met before. But the Queen stopped the menacing hand with a still swifter action and said in an undertone to the count:
"Do not hasten our ruin! prudence, my lord! let us gain time for Bouille to arrive."
"You are right," said Choiseul, putting up the firearm.
The Queen glanced at Charny whom she had thought would have been the first to intervene: but, astonishing thing! Charny seemed not to want the new-comer to notice him, and shrank into the darkest corner apparently in that end.
But she did not doubt him or that he would step out of the mystery and shadow at the proper time.
The threatening move of the nobleman against the representative of the National Assembly had passed over without the latter appearing to remark his escape from death.
Besides, another emotion than fear seemed to monopolize his heart: there was no mistaking his face's expression; so looks the hunter who has tracked to the den of the lion, the lioness and their cubs, with their jackals,—amongst whom was devoured his only child!
But the King had winced at the word "Prisoners," which had made Choiseul revolt.
"Prisoners, in the name of the Assembly? what do you mean? I do not understand you."
"It is plain, and easy enough," replied the man. "In spite of the oath you took not to go out of France, you have fled in the night, betraying your pledge, the Nation and the people; hence the nation have cried 'To arms!' risen, and to say:—by the voice of one of your lowest subjects, not less powerful because it comes from below, though: 'Sire, in the name of the people, the nation and the National Assembly, you are my prisoner!"
In the adjoining room, a cheer burst at the words.
"My lady," said Choiseul to the Queen, in her ear, "do not forget that you stopped me and that you would not suffer this insult if your pity had not interfered for this bully."
"It will go for nothing if we are revenged," she replied.
"But if not?"
She could only groan hollowly and painfully. But Charny's hand was slowly reached over the duke's shoulder and touched the Queen's arm. She turned quickly.
"Let that man speak and act—I answer for him," said the count.
Meanwhile the monarch, stunned by the fresh blow dealt him, stared with amazement at the gloomy figure which had spoken so energetic a language, and curiosity was mingled with it from his belief that he had seen him before.
"Well, in short, what do you want? Speak," he said.
"Sire, I am here to prevent you and the Royal Family taking another step towards the frontier."
"I suppose you come with thousands of men to oppose my march," went on the King, who became grander during his discussion.
"No, Sire, I am alone, or with only another, General Lafayette's aid-de-camp, sent by him and the Assembly to have the orders of the Nation executed. I am sent by Mayor Bailly, but I come mainly on my own behalf to watch this envoy and blow out his brains if he flinches."
All the hearers looked at him with astonishment; they had never seen the commoners but oppressed or furious, and begging for pardon or murdering all before them; for the first time they beheld a man of the people upright, with folded arms, feeling his force and speaking in the name of his rights.
Louis saw quickly that nothing was to be hoped from one of this metal and said in his eagerness to finish with him:
"Where is your companion?"
"Here he is, behind me," said he, stepping forward so as to disclose the doorway, where might be seen a young man in staff-officer's uniform, who was leaning against the window. He was also in disorder but it was of fatigue not force. His face looked mournful. He held a paper in his hand.
This was Captain Romeuf, Lafayette's aid, a sincere patriot, but during Lafayette's dictature while he was superintending the Tuileries, he had shown so much respectful delicacy that the Queen had thanked him on several occasions.
"Oh, it is you?" she exclaimed, painfully surprised. "I never should have believed it," she added, with the painful groan of a beauty who feels her fancied invincible power failing.
"Good, it looks as if I were quite right to come," muttered the second deputy, smiling.
The impatient King did not give the young officer time to present his warrant; he took a step towards him rapidly and snatched it from his hands.
"There is no longer a King in France," he uttered after having read it.
The companion of Romeuf smiled as much as to say: "I knew that all along."
The Queen moved towards the King to question him at these words.
"Listen, madam," he said, "to the decree the Assembly has presumed to issue."
In a voice shaking with indignation he read the following lines:
"It is hereby ordered by the Assembly that the Home Secretary shall send instantly messengers into every department with the order for all functionaries, National Guards, and troops of the line in the country to arrest or have arrested all persons soever attempting to leave the country, as well as to prevent all departure of goods, arms, ammunition, gold and silver, horses and vehicles; and in case these messengers overtake the King, or any members of the Royal Family, and those who connive at their absconding, the said functionaries, National Guards and troops of the line are to take, and hereby are bound to take, all measure possible to check the said absconding, prevent the absconders continuing their route, and give an account immediately to the House of Representatives."
The Queen listened in torpor—but when the King finished she shook her head to arouse her wits and said:
"Impossible—give it to me," and she held out her hand for the fatal message.
In the meantime Romeuf's companion was encouraging the National Guards and patriots of Varennes with a smile.
Though they had heard the tenor of the missive the Queen's expression of "Impossible!" had startled them.
"Read, Madam, and if still you doubt," said the King with bitterness; "it is written and signed by the Speaker of the House."
"What man dares write and sign such impudence?"
"A peer of the realm—the Marquis of Beauharnais."
Is it not a strange thing, which proves how events are mysteriously linked together, that the decree stopping Louis in his flight should bear a name, obscure up to then, yet about to be attached in a brilliant manner with the history of the commencement of the 19th Century?
The Queen read the paper, frowning. The King took it to re-peruse it and then tossed it aside so carelessly that it fell on the sleeping prince and princess's couch. At this, the Queen, incapable of self-constraint any longer, rose quickly with an angry roar, and seizing the paper, crushed it up in her grip before throwing it afar, with the words:
"Be careful, my lord—I would not have such a filthy rag sully my children."
A deafening clamor arose from the next room, and the Guards made a movement to rush in upon the illustrious fugitives. Lafayette's aid let a cry of apprehension escape him. His companion uttered one of wrath.
"Ha," he growled between his teeth, "is it thus you insult the Assembly, the Nation and the people?—very well, we shall see! Come, citizens!" he called out, turning to the men without, already excited by the contest, and armed with guns, scythes mounted on poles like spears, and swords.
They were taking the second stride to enter the room and Heaven only knows what would have been the shock of two such enmities, had not Charny sprang forward. He had kept aloof during the scene, and now grasping the National Guards man by the wrist as he was about to draw his sabre, he said:
"A word with you, Farmer Billet; I want to speak with you."
Billet, for it was he, emitted a cry of astonishment, turned pale as death, stood irresolute for an instant, and then said as he sheathed the half-drawn steel:
"Have it so. I have to speak with you, Lord Charny." He proceeded to the door and said: "Citizens, make room if you please. I have to confer with this officer; but have no uneasiness," he added in a low voice, "there shall not escape one wolf, he or she, or yet a whelp. I am on the lookout and I answer for them!"
As if this man had the right to give them orders, though he was unknown to them all—save Charny—they backed out and left the inner room free. Besides, each was eager to relate to those without what had happened inside, and enjoin all patriots to keep close watch.
In the meantime Charny whispered to the Queen:
"Romeuf is a friend of yours; I leave him with you—get the utmost from him."
This was the more easy as Charny closed the door behind him to prevent anybody, even Billet, entering.