"You are a kind little chap!" he said at last, "and a grateful one too! Yes, we need a laundress badly, and no doubt they will be glad to have found one so soon. I will use what influence I have. But about the little Yvonne,—we must see later!" The next week it was all settled. Mère Clouet was notified of her appointment as laundress to the Tower, and Barelle whispered to Jean that he thought they could manage it about Yvonne.
Jean was ecstatic at the success of his scheme! So was the good Mère Clouet, and as for Yvonne,—she never slept a wink the night before she went for the first time, so excited was she over the prospect! Jean gave her a long list of instructions early that morning, before he departed for Père Lefèvre's. Among them, these were the principal ones:
"Don't let anyone see by your words or actions that you know him or have seen him before! And don't let anyone overhear what you tell him!" Yvonne promised, understanding thoroughly the necessity for the utmost caution. She and her mother packed the clothes in a great basket, hired a carriage for a franc, and were driven to the Temple. At the outer courtyard the carriage was stopped by a sentry on duty, and they were obliged to carry the heavy basket across to the door of the inner courtyard. Yvonne saw Jean standing in the doorway of the tavern, but, with a prudence beyond her years, she refrained from noticing him in any way, as likewise did her mother.
At the inner gate they were again halted. Here Citizeness Clouet must stop, as she was allowed to go no further. Every article of clothes must be taken from the basket and minutely examined to see that they contained no hidden writing or messages from the outer world. This was a long and tiresome process. While it was being completed, Citizen Barelle called to Yvonne:
"Come with me and romp with the little fellow upstairs awhile! You are not afraid, are you?"
"I think not!" she replied, putting her hand in his. And they climbed the gloomy, guarded stairs together. At the door of the room on the second floor Barelle gave a command to the sentry, the clanking bolts and chains were drawn, the door opened, and they stood in the presence of Louis XVII of France! Yvonne could scarcely believe her eyes! Had she not known whom she was going to see, she would never have recognised him. Remembering the beautiful boy in the Tuileries garden, the laughing, dimpled face, the long curls of golden-brown, the round graceful limbs, the sweet trusting blue eyes, she shrank back and drew in her breath with almost a sob.
On a chair in a corner sat the unhappy monarch. His little body, grown thin and wasted by captivity and ill-treatment, was clad in a startling red suit. On his shorn, jagged hair rested a liberty-cap. His cheeks were sunken and pale, and his eyes red with weeping. Over him towered the burly form of the cobbler.
"Sing that song about the 'Austrian Wolf,' you wretched little cub, or I'll throttle you!" he threatened.