Sausse and his colleagues had gone out, promising that the horses should be harnessed to the carriage.
But the Queen's bearing showed that she attached little faith to the pledge, which caused Choiseul to say to his party:
"Gentlemen, do not trust to the feigned tranquility of our masters; the position is not hopeless and we must look it in the face. The probability is that at present, Marquis Bouille has been informed, and will be arriving here about six, as he ought to be at hand with some of the royal Germans. His vanguard may be only half an hour before him; for in such a scrape all that is possible ought to be performed. But we must not deceive ourselves about the four or five thousand men surrounding us, and that the moment they see the troops, there will be dreadful excitement and imminent danger.
"They will try to drag the King back from Varennes, put him on a horse and carry him to Clermont, threaten and have a try at his life perhaps—but this will only be a temporary danger," added Choiseul, "and as soon as the barricades are stormed and our cavalry inside the town, the route will be complete. Therefore we ten men must hold out as many minutes; as the land lays we may hope to lose but a man a minute, so that we have time enough."
The audience nodded; this devotion to the death's point, thus plainly set down, was accepted with the same simplicity.
"This is what we must do," continued the count, "at the first shot we hear and shout without, we rush into the outer room, where we kill everybody in it, and take possession of the outlets: three windows, where three of us defend. The seven others stand on the stairs which the winding will facilitate our defending as one may face a score. The bodies of the slain will serve as rampart; it is a hundred to one that the troops will be masters of the town, before we are killed to the last man, and though that happens, we will fill a glorious page in history, as recompense for our sacrifice."
The chosen ones shook hands on this pledge like Spartans, and selected their stations during the action: the two Lifeguards, and Isidore, whose place was kept though he was absent, at the three casements on the street; Choiseul at the staircase foot; next him, Damas, and the rest of the soldiers.
As they settled their arrangements, bustle was heard in the street.
In came a second deputation headed by Sausse, the National Guards commander Hannonet, and three or four town officers. Thinking they came to say the horses were put to the coach, the King ordered their admittance.
The officers who were trying to read every token, believed that Sausse betrayed hesitation but that Hannonet had a settled will which was of evil omen.