He belonged to the Constitutional Royalist party.
"Gentlemen," said the King as he took his seat, "I declare to you that it never was my intention to quit the kingdom."
"That being so, the words will save France," replied Barnave, looking at him ere he sat down.
Thereupon something strange transpired between this scion of the country middle class and the woman descended from the greatest throne of Europe. Each tried to read the other's heart, not like two political foes, hiding state secrets, but like a man and a woman seeking mysteries of love.
Barnave aimed in all things to be the heir and successor of Mirabeau. In everybody's eyes Mirabeau passed for having enjoyed the King's confidence and the Queen's affection. We know what the truth was. It was not only the fashion then to spread libels but to believe in them.
Barnave's desire to be Mirabeau in all respects is what led him to be appointed one of the three Commissioners to bring back the Royal Family.
He came with the assurance of the man who knows that he has the power to make himself hated if he cannot make himself loved.
The Queen divined this with her woman's eye if she did not perceive it.
She also observed Barnave's moodiness.
Half a dozen times in a quarter of an hour, Barnave turned to look at the three Lifeguards on the box, examining them with scrupulous attention, and dropping his glance to the Queen more hard and hostile than before.