"Marie," said the king, grasping the hand of his wife with unwonted eagerness, and pressing it tenderly to his lips, "Marie, I thank you in the name of all my subjects. You have acted this hour not only as a queen, but as the mother of my people."
"Ah, sir," replied the queen, with a sad smile, "only that the children will not believe in the love of their mother—only that your subjects do not consider me their mother, but their enemy."
"They have been misguided," said the king. "Evil-minded men have deceived them, but I hope we shall succeed in bringing the people back from their error."
"Sire," sighed Marie Antoinette, "I hope for nothing more; but," added she, with still firmer voice, "I also fear nothing more. The worst may break over me—it shall find me armed!"
The side-door now opened, and Madame de Campan entered.
"Your majesty," said she, bowing low, "a great number of ladies from the Faubourg St. Germain are in the small reception-room. They wish to testily their devotion to your majesty."
"I will receive them at once," cried Marie Antoinette, with an almost joyful tone. "Ah, only see, husband, the consolations which misfortune brings. These ladies of the Faubourg St. Germain formerly cut me; they could not forget that I was an Austrian. To-day they feel that I am the Queen of France, and that I belong to them. Pardon me, sire, for leaving you."
She hastened away with a rapid step. The king looked after her with an expression of pain. "Poor queen," he whispered to himself, "how much she is misjudged, how wrongly she is calumniated! And I cannot change it, and must let it be."
He sank with a deep sigh, which seemed much like a groan, into an arm-chair, and was lost in painful recollections. A gentle touch on his hand, which rested on the side-arm of the chair, restored him to consciousness. Before him stood the dauphin, and looked gravely and thoughtfully out of his large blue eyes up into his father's face.
"Ah, is it you, my little Louis Charles?" said the king, nodding to him. "What do you want of me, my child?"