The police, fertile in strategies, thought they could make use of Deutz and of the correspondence he carried to make the duchess fall into a trap and so fall into the hands of the Government agents. Consequently, they made overtures to this traitor; he had been presented at Court; he had seen renegades become illustrious; he was conscious of his strength and the means and power at his disposal; he knew that it was in the salons of ministers that perfidy and State reasons met together; he wished, then, to treat with the Government alone. He therefore obtained an audience with M. de Montalivet, and it was in the cabinet of his Excellency that they settled the price of an infamous piece of treachery.
What passed during that interview, what promises were made, what offers accepted, remains a secret between the minister and Deutz; for I presume Providence does not interfere in these affairs seeing they succeed. Still, they hesitated to make use of the instrument when they had found it, and great was the embarrassment at the château. The Duchesse de Berry, arrested, would become answerable before a Court of Assizes which might very easily condemn her to death; the king, it is true, had his right of pardon; but there are moments when that right is as difficult to exercise as is the right of death. On the other side, to leave the duchess alone was not without its inconvenience; the Chamber was stupid enough to grow tired of civil war as of anything else, and to demand a stop to it; in short, M. de Montalivet was exceedingly embarrassed by his traitor, not knowing what to do and almost in despair at having been so clever.
About this time ministerial changes took place; M. de Montalivet passed on to the civil list, and M. Thiers to the Home Office. The young minister saw in this change of place a means of getting rid of his Judas by sending him elsewhere to ask for his thirty pieces of silver; but Deutz raised difficulties; he had begun the business with the count and wished to conclude it with him; he knew M. de Montalivet, and did not know M. Thiers. Finally, after much parleying, M. de Montalivet persuaded him to accompany him in his carriage to M. Thiers. M. Thiers had too much tact and finesse not to seize upon the occasion to make his appointment less unpopular, and he was too clever not to try by a grand coup to get himself forgiven. The capture of the Duchesse de Berry would draw the Chamber to him and the Chamber pretty well meant the nation. M. Thiers would thence become a national hero.
Deutz left for la Vendée, accompanied by Joly, the inspector of police, and arrived there under the name of Hyacinthe de Gonzaque.
[1] See, for fuller details, La Vendée et Madame, an account written by me from Dermoncourt's notes.