“Very well, then,” she replied sharply, “send for one.”
A servant was despatched and returned with a Justice of the Peace. He gravely took written note of all:
“Item: the lower left panel broken;
“Item: the upper left panel cracked;
“Item: the lower right hinge of the door torn off, and the post splintered.”
All was done in order, and they returned to find the King. The King was annoyed. They noticed him grumbling and moving his lips and teeth. He was even a little excited, but his training in names and faces, which is the one acquired talent of high functionaries, served him well. He spoke with authority, knowing each of them and addressing them in turn, and after speaking of the mob he particularly complained that roughs climbed the palings of the Tuileries gardens and disturbed his privacy. The Queen interrupted from time to time to reproach them. “Why had they not prevented the procession of the mob through the palace? Why, at least, had they not given warning? The Department had done its duty! Why not they?” The King continued in another tone, till, at last, some of them coming nearer home asked him for news of the armies. His dignity as the Executive (which he still was) forbade him any full replies: he had good news, very good news ... he could tell them no more.
They suspected [we know] that there was no news at all ... only a few packed, ill-ordered garrisons awaiting the attack; a long line in the field all the way from Belfort to the sea, numbering but 80,000 men, and half of that an ill-clothed helter-skelter of broken companies: divided counsel, no plan, and, a few marches East, that slow concentration of the Allies upon Coblenz which now drew to its close.
So the Deputies left them: the sky was still full of light on this shortest night of the year, and Paris after the uproar of that bacchanalian Wednesday, the 20th of June, was silent.
Meanwhile the South had risen.