"Look! there is the woman who murdered her husband, and would have murdered her children too!" "There is the wretch who would have poisoned the king!" "There stands the accomplice of La Voisin!" "And while her tool languishes in prison, she has no right to breathe the free air of heaven!" "Away with her to the Bastile!" "To the Bastile, to the Bastile!" "No! let her be burned for her crimes!"
"Louvois! Louvois!" murmured Olympia, her brow reddening with humiliation.
Another yell from the besiegers was silenced by a loud voice, whose words of command rose clear above the tumult.
"I knew it," said Eugene, "they have a leader. There is a method in these manifestations which shows that they are not the disconnected efforts of a many-headed monster."
"Great God! And the guards are not even to be seen!" cried Latour, who stood with folded hands, murmuring snatches of prayer for help.
"Nor will they be seen," added Olympia, in a low voice.
Eugene was glancing now at his mother, now at her persecutors. As his eye wandered from one to another of the uplifted and angry faces below, he saw two men somewhat elevated above the rest, who with their outstretched arms were giving the signal for a fresh onslaught. No demonstration, however, followed the command, for the people had gravitated into one solid body, of which no portion was capable of independent action.
"Now," thought the prince, "now would be the opportunity for retaliation. If I had but the means!—Latour." continued he, aloud, "do the iron gates of entrance open within or without?"
"Without, your highness."
"So that if we could get access to the street, we might cage up these base-born villains, might we not?"