"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.