"The queen!" repeated the maniac, whose madness every moment increased, "if she is the queen, let her defend my poor girl from the hangmen who seek her life—Let her show mercy to my poor Héloïse!—Kings show mercy—Render me back my child, and I will acknowledge you as queen. Till then, you are only a woman, and a woman who brings misery upon all, and kills all—"
"Oh, have pity, Madame!" cried Marie Antoinette; "you see my tears and distress," and she again made an attempt to pass, no longer from any hope of escape, but to free herself from this cruel attack.
"You shall not pass!" roared the old woman. "You want to escape, Madame Veto—I know it all, the man in the mantle told me; you want to go and rejoin the Prussians. But you shall not escape," continued she, clasping the robe of the queen; "I will prevent you. À la lanterne, Madame Veto! To arms, citizens! let us march—"
And with her arms wrestling, her grizzled locks dishevelled and hanging over her haggard countenance, her eyes blood-shot, the unfortunate creature fell to the ground, in her fall tearing the robe she still held in her hand.
The queen, terrified, but freed at last from the maniac, was flying to the side of the garden, when all at once a terrible cry resounded, mingled with loud barking, and accompanied with a strange uproar, arousing the National Guards from their stupor, who, attracted by the uproar, immediately surrounded Marie Antoinette.
"To arms! to arms! Treason!" shouted a man, whom from his voice the queen recognized as the shoemaker Simon.
Near this man, who, sword in hand, guarded the threshold of the cabin, little Jet was barking furiously.
"To arms! every one to his post!" cried Simon; "we are betrayed. Compel the Austrian to turn back. To arms! to arms!"
An officer ran up, when Simon spoke to him, pointing with enraged gestures to the interior of the hut. The officer in his turn then cried "To arms!"
"Jet! Jet!" called the queen, advancing some steps.