THE noisy, good-natured, and very dangerous mob had gone at last; their final stragglers, gazing, curious and tired, at the pictures and the gilding (the trappings of their Public King in his great Public Palace), had wandered out. A few steps on the wide stone stairs of the central pavilion were still heard lazily descending. The dishevelled family was at rest.
A little group of Deputies remained behind, and talked in low and careful voices to the King and Queen—principally to the Queen, for she was voluble. She was suave, though somewhat garrulously suave. “Would not some of these gentlemen come and see her put the Dauphin to bed?” A familiar appeal made by the very wealthy to the middle class rarely fails. They followed respectfully and a little awkwardly to where, in a small bed out of her room, the child slept. She had him ready for bed in a few moments; then she said to him, smiling:
“Tell the gentlemen you love the Nation, darling.”
The drowsy child repeated mechanically, “I love the Nation.”
The Middle Class were enchanted. She laid him down, doubtless with every maternal charm; she turned to go before them, certainly with an exaggeration of that excessive carriage which had delighted so many foreigners and dependants for now twenty years and had done much to lose her the respect of her French equals at the Court. The select committee of the Middle Class came after.
“See what damage they have done: look at these doors!”
The Deputies stooped solemnly to examine the broken panels and the hinges torn from their screws, the oak splinters showing dark against the white paint and the gold. They admitted serious damage—they regretted it.
“Who is the proper authority to take note of this?”
They looked at one another; then one of them, remembering the Constitution, Liberty and the rest of it, said:
“Nowadays the proper authority before which to bring such misdemeanours is a Justice of the Peace.”