“Yet I am inclined to think that there is more pertinence in the remark about a woman’s rôle in a plot than the writer knows,” muttered his listener.
“I wish to goodness that Louis would think less about a woman’s rôle in any capacity,” returned the Marquis, with a slight show of impatience.
“Can the boy for a moment,” said the Curé, ignoring Château-Foix’ remark, “believe in the sincerity of this divinity, as he calls her? Surely he must know that there was a suspicion of her being implicated in the affair of the Necklace? If the idea of a Girondin-émigré alliance were not on the face of it an impossibility, the mere presence of a woman ought to be enough to rouse suspicion. The game is as old as Delilah and Jael.”
“Then what do you make of this project of Louis’?” asked Gilbert.
“It is a trap,” returned the Curé, quickening his steps and his speech. “I have not a doubt of it. Can a leopard change his spots? No; and can the deputies of the Gironde, who have spent their time since the autumn in passing laws against the émigrés, now be desirous of an alliance with them. The idea is preposterous.”
“If they are,” said the Marquis, “their conversion must certainly have been speedy, for it is less than a month ago that the King’s constitutional guard was dismissed, and less still since Servan’s abominable proposals for the formation of a camp of scoundrels outside Paris passed the Assembly.”
“And if our last news is true—as seems likely—that the King refuses his assent to that, as he has done to Vergniaud’s iniquitous scheme for deportation of priests, you may be quite sure that the Gironde will never forgive him.”
“But if it is only a trap, a bogus conspiracy, what do the Girondin party hope to gain by it?” asked the Marquis, knitting his brows.
“This,” answered the priest. “The Gironde has long been hinting that the Court wishes for nothing less than the invasion of France by the Emperor, and that it communicates its desires by secret messages to Coblentz. But they have no proofs to show to the people. Very well, then, if they can persuade a certain number of young hotheads about the King to believe in their sincerity, they will have their names and signatures, most probably, as evidence, when the time for denunciation is ripe. That these ‘conspirators’ are unimportant does not matter a straw—they are Royalists. For all we know, a list of false names may be in circulation also, which would account for the appearance of yours.”
“If this explanation be anything like the truth,” said Château-Foix, “then not only the King and the Court are imperilled, but Louis himself is in the gravest danger. I had better start for Paris to-night.”