"But," continued Mère Clouet, "it was kind of that strange young man to take you into the club to-night! Did you learn who he may be?"
"Indeed I did!" answered the boy. "All through the meeting he sat with his arms folded and his strange eyes fixed on the speakers. Once, when Santerre harangued us, I heard him mutter, 'Canaille!' and another time when Robespierre was speaking, he whispered to me, 'That is a man of power, but—one should beware!' When we left the club, we parted on the Rue St. Honoré, and he said, 'Perhaps you will tell me your name, young sir. You seem a lad of spirit!' When I had informed him, he told me his own. 'Tis a strange one, and has a foreign sound,—Napoleon Bonaparte!"
IN WHICH THE DAUPHIN WEARS THE RED CAP
CHAPTER III
IN WHICH THE DAUPHIN WEARS THE RED CAP
There is nothing in this world so fickle as a Parisian mob! A breath, a word, a gesture even, can often turn it aside from its most murderous purpose, and bring it worshipping to the very feet of those it sought but a moment before to destroy!
The great palace of the Tuileries was crowded to suffocation. Hordes of savage men, women, and even children from the poorest quarters of Paris, thronged, jostled and fought one another to get a sight of their hated sovereigns. A small company of soldiers strove in vain to clear the rooms and defend the royalty from the taunts and insults of the populace. Outside the palace, a still greater section of the mob, unable to force an entrance, shrieked for something spectacular, even to demanding the heads of the royal family. It was a wild, turbulent scene!