"Long live the queen! Long live Marie Antoinette!" shouted the public.
Marie Antoinette bowed and greeted the audience on all sides with a sad smile, but not one look did she cast to the box where Barnave sat, with not one smile did she thank him for the service he had done her. For the queen knew well that her favor brought misfortune to those who shared it; that he on whom she bestowed a smile was the object of the people's suspicion.
The public continued to shout her name, but the queen felt herself exhausted, and drawing back from the front of the box, she beckoned to her companion. "Come," she whispered, "let us go while the public are calling 'Long live Marie Antoinette!' Who knows whether they will not be shouting in another minute, 'Away with the queen! we want no queen!' It pains my ear so to hear that, so let us go."
And while the public were yet crying, Marie Antoinette left the box and passed out into the corridor, followed by Mademoiselle Bugois and the two officers in attendance. But the corridor which the queen had to pass, the staircase which she had to descend in order to reach her carriage, were both occupied by a dense throng. With the swiftness of the wind the news had spread through Paris that the queen was going to visit the opera that evening, and that her visit would not take place without witnessing some extraordinary outbreak.
The royalists had hastened thither, to salute the queen, and at least to see her on the way. The curious, the idle, and the hostile- minded had come to see what should take place, and to shout as the majority might shout. The great opera-house had therefore not accommodated half who wanted to be present, and all those who had been refused admittance had taken their station on the stairway and the corridor, or before the main entrance. And it was natural that those who stood before the door should, by their merely being there, excite the curiosity of passers-by, so that these, too, stood still, to see what was going on, and all pressed forward to the staircase to see every thing and to hear every thing.
But the civil war which was raging within the theatre had given rise 'to battles outside as well; the same cries which had resounded within, pealed along the path of the queen. She could only advance slowly; closer and closer thronged the crowd, louder and louder roared around Marie Antoinette the various battle-cries of the parties, "Long live the queen!" "Long live the National Assembly! Down with the queen!"
Marie Antoinette appeared to hear neither the one nor the other of these cries. With proudly erected head, and calm, grave looks, she walked forward, untroubled about the crowd, which the National Guard before her could only break through by a recourse to threats and violence, in order to make a passage for the queen.
At last the difficult task was done; at last she had reached her carriage, and could rest upon its cushions, and, unobserved by spying looks, could give way to her grief and her tears. But alas! this consolation continued only for a short time. The carriage soon stopped; the Tuileries, that sad, silent prison of the royal family, was soon reached, and Marie Antoinette quickly dried her tears, and compelled herself to appear calm.
"Do not weep more, Bugois," she whispered. "We will not give our enemies the triumph of seeing that they have forced tears from us. Try to be cheerful, and tell no one of the insults of this evening."
The carriage door was opened, the queen dismounted, and, surrounded by National Guards and officers, returned to her apartments.