The expected signal had at last been given from the St. Cloud gate, but did not come from the licensed conspirators. An amateur spy, Ducatel, was crossing these quarters, when he saw everything, gates and ramparts, quite deserted. He thereupon climbed the bastion 64, waving a white handkerchief, and cried to the soldiers of the trenches, "You can enter; there is no one here." A naval officer came forward, interrogated Ducatel, crossed over the ruins of the drawbridge, and was able to assure himself that the bastions and neighbouring houses were entirely abandoned. Returning immediately to the trenches, the officer telegraphed the news to the nearest generals. The breach batteries ceased firing, and the soldiers of the trenches near penetrated by small platoons into the enceinte. M. Thiers, MacMahon, and Admiral Pothuan, who were just then at Mont-Valérien, telegraphed to Versailles to have all the divisions put in motion.
Dombrowski, absent from his headquarters of La Muette for several hours, arrived at four o'clock. A commander met him, and informed him of the entry of the Versaillese. Dombrowski let the officer terminate his report, then, turning to one of his aides-de-camp, with that coolness that he exaggerated in critical circumstances, said, "Send to the Ministry of Marine for a battery of seven cannon; warn such and such battalions. I shall take the command myself." He also addressed a despatch to the Committee of Public Safety and the War Office, and sent the battalion of volunteers to occupy the gate of Auteuil.
At five o'clock, National Guards, without képis, without arms, uttered a cry of alarm in the streets of Passy; some officers unsheathing their swords tried to stop them; the Federals left their houses, some loading their guns, others maintaining that it was a false alarm. The commander of the volunteers picked up and led off as many men as he could get to follow him.
These volunteers were troops inured to fire. Near the railway station they saw the red-coats, and received them with a volley. A Versaillese officer on horseback, who hurried up trying to urge on his men with drawn sabre, fell beneath our balls, and his soldiers retreated. The Federals established themselves solidly on the viaduct and at the opening of the Murat Boulevard, while, at the same time, the quay abreast of the Jena Bridge was being barricaded.
Dombrowski's despatch had reached the Committee of Public Safety. Billioray, on duty at this moment, at once proceeded to the Council. The Assembly was just putting Cluseret on his trial, and Vermorel was speaking. The ex-delegate, seated on a chair, listened to the orator with that vain nonchalance which the naïve took for talent. Billioray, very pale, entered, and for a moment sat down; then, as Vermorel went on, cried to him, "Conclude! conclude! I have to make a communication of the greatest importance to the Assembly; I demand a secret sitting."
Vermorel: "Let citizen Billioray speak."
Billioray rose and read a paper that trembled slightly in his hand. "Dombrowski to War and Committee of Public Safety. The Versaillese have entered by the Porte de St. Cloud. I take measures to drive them back. If you can send me reinforcements, I answer for everything."[178]
There was first a silence of anguish, soon broken by interpellations. "Some battalions have marched off," answered Billioray; "the Committee of Public Safety watches."
The discussion was again taken up, and naturally cut short. The Council acquitted Cluseret; the ridiculous impeachment brought forward by Miot, made up only of gossip, neglected the only incriminating fact—the inactivity of Cluseret during his delegation. They then formed into groups and commented on the despatch. The confidence of Dombrowski, the assurance of Billioray, proved quite sufficient to the romanticists. What with faith in the general, the solidity of the ramparts, the immortality of the cause; what with the responsibility of the Committee of Public Safety, the question at issue was slurred over; let every one go about in search of information, and in case of need betake himself to his own arrondissement.
The time was wasted in small-talk; there were neither motion nor debate; eight o'clock struck, and the president raised the sitting. The last sitting of the Council! And there was no one to demand a permanent committee; no one to call on his colleague to wait here for news, to summon the Committee of Public Safety to the bar of the Council. There was no one to insist that at this critical moment of uncertainty, when perhaps it might be necessary to improvise a plan of defence at a moment's notice or take a great resolution in case of disaster, the post of the guardians of Paris was in the centre, at the Hôtel-de-Ville, and not in their respective arrondissements.