The Countess of Charny; or, The Execution of King Louis XVI

"Farmer Billet," said he, "what was your report about the House?"

"That it would hold an all-night sitting."

"Very good; and what did you say you saw on the New Bridge?"

"Cannon and Guards, placed by order of Colonel Mandat."

"And you also stated that a considerable force was collected under St. John's Arcade, near the opening of St. Antoine Street?"

"Yes; again, by order of Colonel Mandat."

"Well, will you listen to me? Here you have an order to Manuel and Danton to send back to barracks the troops at St. John's Arcade, and to remove the guns from the bridge; at any cost, you will understand, these orders must be obeyed."

"I will hand it to Danton myself."

"Good. You are living in St. Honore Street?"

"Yes, mayor."

"When you have given Danton the order, get home and snatch a bit of rest. About two o'clock, go out to the Feuillants' Quay, where you will stand by the wall. If you see or hear stones falling over from the other side of the wall, it will mean that I am a prisoner in the Tuileries, and detained by violence."

"I understand."

"Present yourself at the bar of the House, and ask my colleagues to claim me. You understand, Farmer Billet, I am placing my life in your hands."

"I will answer for it," replied the bluff farmer; "take it easy."

Petion had therefore gone into the lion's den, relying on Billet's patriotism.

The latter had spoken the more firmly, as Pitou had come to town. He dispatched the young peasant to Danton, with the word for him not to return without him. Lazy as the orator was, Pitou had a prevailing way, and he brought Danton with him.

Danton had seen the cannon on the bridge, and the National Guards at the end of the popular quarter, and he understood the urgency of not leaving such forces on the rear of the people's army. With Petion's order in hand, he and Manuel sent the Guards away and removed the guns.

This cleared the road for the Revolution.

In the meantime, Billet and Pitou had gone to their old lodging in St. Honore Street, to which Pitou bobbed his head as to an old friend. The farmer sat down, and signified the young man was to do the same.

"Thank you, but I am not tired," returned Pitou; but the other insisted, and he gave way.

"Pitou, I sent for you to join me," said the farmer.

"And you see I have not kept you waiting," retorted the National Guards captain, with his own frank smile, showing all his thirty-two teeth.

"No. You must have guessed that something serious is afoot."

"I suspected as much. But, I say, friend Billet, I do not see anything of Mayor Bailly or General Lafayette."

"Bailly is a traitor, who nearly murdered the lot of us on the parade-ground."

"Yes, I know that, as I picked you up there, almost swimming in your own blood."

"And Lafayette is another traitor, who wanted to take away the king."

"I did not know that. Lafayette a traitor, eh? I never would have thought of that. And the king?"

"He is the biggest traitor of the lot, Pitou."

"I can not say I am surprised at that," said Pitou.

"He conspires with the foreigner, and wants to deliver France to the enemy. The Tuileries is the center of the conspiracy, and we have decided to take possession of the Tuileries. Do you understand this, Pitou?"

"Of course I understand. But, look here, Master Billet; we took the Bastile, and this will not be so hard a job."

"That's where you are out."

"What, more difficult, when the walls are not so high?"

"That's so; but they are better guarded. The Bastile had but a hundred old soldiers to guard it, while the palace has three or four thousand men; this is saying nothing of the Bastile having been carried by surprise, while the Tuileries folk must know we mean to attack, and will be on the lookout."

"They will defend it, will they?" queried Pitou.

"Yes," replied Billet – "all the more as the defense is trusted to Count Charny, they say."

"Indeed. He did leave Boursonnes with his lady by the post," observed Pitou. "Lor', is he a traitor, too?"

"No; he is an aristocrat, that is all. He has always been for the court, so that he is no traitor to the people; he never asked us to put any faith in him."

"So it looks as though we will have a tussle with Lord Charny?"

"It is likely, friend Ange."

"What a queer thing it is, neighbors clapper-clawing!"

"Yes – what is called civil war, Pitou; but you are not obliged to fight unless you like."

"Excuse me, farmer, but it suits me from the time when it is to your taste."

"But I should even like it better if you did not fight."

"Why did you send for me, Master Billet?"

"I sent for you to give you this paper," replied Billet, with his face clouding.

"What is this all about?"

"It is the draft of my will."

"Your will?" cried Pitou, laughing. "Hang me, if you look like a man about to die!"

"No; but I may be a man who will get killed," returned the revolutionist, pointing to his gun and cartridge-box hanging on the wall.

"That's a fact," said Ange Pitou; "we are all mortal."

"So that I have come to place my will in your hands as the sole legatee."

"No, I thank you. But you are only saying this for a joke?"

"I am telling you a fact."

"But it can not be. When a man has rightful heirs he can not give away his property to outsiders."

"You are wrong, Pitou; he can."

"Then he ought not."

"I have no heirs," replied Billet, with a dark cloud passing over his face.

"No heirs? How about heiresses, then? What do you call Miss Catherine?"

"I do not know anybody of that name, Pitou."

"Come, come, farmer, do not say such things; you make me sad."

"Pitou, from the time when something is mine, it is mine to give away; in the same way, should I die, what I leave to you will be yours, to deal with as you please, to be given away as freely."

"Ha! Good – yes," exclaimed the young man, who began to understand; "then, if anything bad happens to you – But how stupid I am; nothing bad could happen to you."

"You yourself said just now that we are all mortal."

"So I did; but – well, I do not know but that you are right. I take the will, Master Billet; but is it true that if I fall heir, I can do as I please with the property?"

"No doubt, since it will be yours. And, you understand, you are a sound patriot, Pitou; they will not stand you off from it, as they might folk who have connived with the aristocrats."

"It's a bargain," said Pitou, who was getting it into his brain; "I accept."

"Then that is all I have to say to you. Put the paper in your pocket and go to sleep."

"What for?"

"Because we shall have some work to do to-morrow – no, this day, for it is two in the morning."

"Are you going out, Master Billet?"

"Only as far as the river."

"You are sure you do not want me?"

"On the other hand, you would be in my way."

"I suppose I might have a bite and a sup, then?"

"Of course. I forgot to ask if you might not be hungry."

"Because you know I am always hungry," said Pitou, laughing.

"I need not tell you where the larder is."

"No, no, master; do not worry about me. But you are going to come back here?"

"I shall return."

"Or else tell me where we are to meet?"

"It is useless, for I shall be home in an hour."

Pitou went in search of the eatables with an appetite which in him, as in the case of the king, no events could alter, however serious they might be, while Billet proceeded to the water-side to do what we know.

He had hardly arrived on the spot before a pebble fell, followed by another, and some more, teaching him that what Petion apprehended had come to pass, and that he was a prisoner to the Royalists. So he had flown, according to his instructions, to the Assembly, which had claimed the mayor, as we have described.

Petion, liberated, had only to walk through the House to get back to the mayor's office, leaving his carriage in the Tuileries yard to represent him.

For his part, Billet went home, and found Ange finishing his supper.

"Any news?" asked he.

"Nothing, except that day is breaking and the sky is the color of blood."

CHAPTER XI.

IN THE MORNING

The early sunbeams shone on two horsemen riding at a walking pace along the deserted water-side by the Tuileries. They were Colonel Mandat and his aid.

At one A. M. he was summoned to the City Hall, and refused to go; but on the order being renewed more peremptorily at two, Attorney Roederer said to him:

"Mark, colonel, that under the law the commander of the National Guard is to obey the City Government."

He decided to go, ignorant of two things.

In the first place, forty-seven sections of the forty-eight had joined to the town rulers each three commissioners, with orders to work with the officials and "save the country." Mandat expected to see the old board as before, and not at all to behold a hundred and forty-one fresh faces. Again, he had no idea of the order from this same board to clear the New Bridge of cannon and vacate St. John's Arcade, an order so important that Danton and Manuel personally had superintended its execution.

Consequently, on reaching the Pont Neuf, Mandat was stupefied to find it utterly deserted. He stopped and sent his aid to scout. In ten minutes this officer returned with the word that he saw no guns or National Guards, while the neighborhood was as lonesome as the bridge.

Mandat continued his way, though he perhaps ought to have gone back to the palace; but men, like things, must wend whither their destiny impels.

Proportionably to his approach to the City Hall, he seemed to enter into liveliness. In the same way as the blood in some organizations leaves the extremities cold and pale on rushing back to fortify the heart, so all the movement and heat – the Revolution, in short – was around the City Hall, the seat of popular life, the heart of that great body, Paris.

He stopped to send his officer to the Arcade; but the National Guard had been withdrawn from there, too. He wanted to retrace his steps; but the crowd had packed in behind him, and he was carried, like a waif on the wave, up the Hall steps.

"Stay here," he said to his follower, "and if evil befalls me, run and tell them at the palace."

Mandat yielded to the mob, and was floated into the grand hall, where he met strange and stern faces. It was the insurrection complete, demanding an account of the conduct of this man, who had not only tried to crush it in its development, but to strangle it in its birth.

One of the members of the Commune, the dread body which was to stifle the Assembly and struggle with the Convention, advanced and in the general's name asked:

"By whose order did you double the palace guard?"

"The Mayor of Paris'."

"Show that order."

"I left it at the Tuileries, so that it might be carried out during my absence."

"Why did you order out the cannon?"

"Because I set the battalion on the march, and the field-pieces move with the regiment."

"Where is Petion?"

"He was at the palace when I last saw him."

"A prisoner?"

"No; he was strolling about the gardens."

The interrogation was interrupted here by a new member bringing an unsealed letter, of which he asked leave to make communication. Mandat had no need to do more than cast a glance on this note to acknowledge that he was lost; he recognized his own writing. It was his order to the commanding officer at St. John's Arcade, sent at one in the morning, for him to attack in the rear the mob making for the palace, while the battalion on New Bridge attacked it in flank. This order had fallen into the Commune's hands after the dismissal of the soldiers.

The examination was over; for what could be more damning than this letter in any admissions of the accused?

The council decided that Mandat should be imprisoned in the abbey. The tale goes that the chairman of the board, in saying, "Remove the prisoner," made a sweep of the hand, edge downward, like chopping with an ax. As the guillotine was not in use then, it must have been an arranged sign – perhaps by the Invisibles, whose Grand Copt had divined that instrument.

At all events, the result showed that the sign was taken to imply death.

Hardly had Mandat gone down three of the City Hall steps before a pistol-shot shattered his skull, at the very instant when his son ran toward him. Three years before, the same reception had met Flesselles.

Mandat was only wounded, but as he rose, he fell again with a score of pike-wounds. The boy held out his hands and wailed for his father, but none paid any heed to him. Presently, in the bloody ring, where bare arms plunged amid flashing pikes and swords, a head was seen to surge up, detached from the trunk.

The boy swooned.

The aid-de-camp galloped back to the Tuileries to report what he had witnessed.

The murderers went off in two gangs: one took the body to the river, to throw it in, the other carried the head through the streets.

This was going on at four in the morning.

Let us precede the aid to the Tuileries, and see what was happening.

Having confessed, and made easy about matters since his conscience was tranquilized, the king, unable to resist the cravings of nature, went to bed. But we must say that he lay down dressed.

On the alarm-bells ringing more loudly, and the roll of the drums beating the reveille, he was roused.

Colonel Chesnaye, to whom Mandat had left his powers, awoke the monarch to have him address the National Guards, and by his presence and some timely words revive their enthusiasm.

The king rose, but half awake, dull and staggering. He was wearing a powdered wig, and he had flattened all the side he had lain upon. The hair-dresser could not be found, so he had to go out with the wig out of trim.

Notified that the king was going to show himself to the defenders, the queen ran out from the council hall where she was.

In contrast with the poor sovereign, whose dim sight sought no one's glance, whose mouth-muscles were flabby and palpitating with involuntary twitches, while his violet coat suggested he was wearing mourning for majesty, the queen was burning with fever, although pale. Her eyes were red, though dry.

She kept close to this phantom of monarchy, who came out in the day instead of midnight, with owlish, blinking eyes. She hoped to inspire him with her overflow of life, strength, and courage.

All went well enough while this exhibition was in the rooms, though the National Guards, mixed in with the noblemen, seeing their ruler close to this poor, flaccid, heavy man, who had so badly failed on a similar occasion at Varennes, wondered if this really was the monarch whose poetical legend the women and the priests were already beginning to weave.

This was not the one they had expected to see.

The aged Duke of Mailly – with one of those good intentions destined to be another paving-stone for down below – drew his rapier, and sinking down at the foot of the king, vowed in a quavering voice to die, he and the old nobility which he represented, for the grandson of Henry IV. Here were two blunders: the National Guards had no great sympathy for the old nobility, and they were not here to defend the descendant of Henry IV., but the constitutional king.

So, in reply to a few shouts of "Hail to the king!" cheers for the nation burst forth on all sides.

Something to make up for this coolness was sought. The king was urged to go down into the royal yard. Alas! the poor potentate had no will of his own. Disturbed at his meals, and cheated, with only one hour's sleep instead of seven, he was but an automaton, receiving impetus from outside its material nature.

Who gave this impetus? The queen, a woman of nerve, who had neither slept nor eaten.

Some unhappy characters fail in all they undertake, when circumstances are beyond their level. Instead of attracting dissenters, Louis XVI., in going up to them, seemed expressly made to show how little glamour majesty can lend a man who has no genius or strength of mind.

Here, as in the rooms, when the Royalists managed to get up a shout of "Long live the king!" an immense hurrah for the nation replied to them.

The Royalists being dull enough to persist, the patriots overwhelmed them with "No, no, no; no other ruler than the nation!"

And the king, almost supplicating, added: "Yes, my sons, the nation and the monarch make but one henceforward."

"Bring the prince," whispered Marie Antoinette to Princess Elizabeth; "perhaps the sight of a child may touch them."

While they were looking for the dauphin, the king continued the sad review. The bad idea struck him to appeal to the artillerists, who were mainly Republicans. If the king had the gift of speech-making, he might have forced the men to listen to him, though their belief led them astray, for it would have been a daring step, and it might have helped him to face the cannon; but there was nothing exhilarating in his words or gesture; he stammered.

The Royalists tried to cover his stammerings with the luckless hail of "Long live the king!" already twice a failure, and it nearly brought about a collision.

Some cannoniers left their places and rushed over to the king, threatening him with their fists, and saying:

"Do you think that we will shoot down our brothers to defend a traitor like you?"

The queen drew the king back.

"Here comes the dauphin!" called out voices. "Long live the hope of the realm!"

Nobody took up the cry. The poor boy had come in at the wrong time; as theatrical language says, he had missed his cue.

The king went back into the palace, a downright retreat – almost a flight. When he got to his private rooms he dropped, puffing and blowing, into an easy-chair.

Stopping by the door, the queen looked around for some support. She spied Charny standing up by the door of her own rooms, and she went over to him.

"Ah, all is lost!" she moaned.

"I am afraid so, my lady," replied the Life Guardsman.

"Can we not still flee?"

"It is too late."

"What is left for us to do, then?"

"We can but die," responded Charny, bowing.

The queen heaved a sigh, and went into her own rooms.

CHAPTER XII.

THE FIRST MASSACRE

Mandat had hardly been slain, before the Commune nominated Santerre as commanding general in his stead, and he ordered the drums to beat in all the town and the bells to be rung harder than ever in all the steeples. He sent out patrols to scour the ways, and particularly to scout around the Assembly.

Some twenty prowlers were made prisoners, of whom half escaped before morning, leaving eleven in the Feuillants' guard-house. In their midst was a dandified young gentleman in the National Guard uniform, the newness of which, the superiority of his weapons, and the elegance of his style, made them suspect he was an aristocrat. He was quite calm. He said that he went to the palace on an order, which he showed the examining committee of the Feuillants' ward. It ran:

"The National Guard, bearer of this paper, will go to the palace to learn what the state of affairs is, and return to report to the Attorney-and-Syndic-General of the Department.

(Signed) "Boirie,"Leroulx,"Municipal Officers."

The order was plain enough, but it was thought that the signatures were forged, and it was sent to the City Hall by a messenger to have them verified.

This last arrest had brought a large crowd around the place, and some such voices as are always to be heard at popular gatherings yelled for the prisoner's death.

An official saw that this desire must not spread, and was making a speech, to which the mob was yielding, when the messenger came back from the Hall to say the order was genuine, and they ought to set at liberty the prisoner named Suleau.

At this name, a woman in the mob raised her head and uttered a scream of rage.

"Suleau?" she cried. "Suleau, the editor of the 'Acts of the Apostles' newspaper, one of the slayers of Liege independence? Let me at this Suleau! I call for the death of Suleau!"

The crowd parted to let this little, wiry woman go through. She wore a riding-habit of the national colors, and was carrying a sword in a cross-belt. She went up to the city official and forced him to give her the place on the stand. Her head was barely above the concourse, before they all roared:

"Bravo, Theroigne!"

Indeed, Theroigne was a most popular woman, so that Suleau had made a hit when he said she was the bride of Citizen Populus, as well as referring to her free-and-easy morals.

Besides, he had published at Brussels the "Alarm for Kings," and thus helped the Belgian outbreak, and to replace under the Austrian cane and the priestly miter a noble people wishing to be free and join France.

At this very epoch Theroigne was writing her memoirs, and had read the part about her arrest there to the Jacobin Club.

She claimed the death of the ten other prisoners along with Suleau.

Through the door he heard her ringing voice, amid applause. He called the captain of the guard to him, and asked to be turned loose to the mob, that by his sacrifice he might save his fellow-prisoners. They did not believe he meant it. They refused to open the door to him, and he tried to jump out of the window, but they pulled him back. They did not think that they would be handed over to the slaughterers in cold blood; they were mistaken.

Intimidated by the yells, Chairman Bonjour yielded to Theroigne's demand, and bid the National Guardsman stand aloof from resisting the popular will. They stepped aside, and the door was left free. The mob burst into the jail and grabbed the first prisoner to hand.

It was a priest, Bonyon, a playwright noted for his failures and his epigrams. He was a large-built man, and fought desperately with the butchers, who tore him from the arms of the commissioner who tried to save him; though he had no weapon but his naked fists, he laid out two or three of the ruffians. A bayonet pinned him to the wall, so that he expired without being able to hit with his last blows.

Two of the prisoners managed to escape in the scuffle.

The next to the priest was an old Royal Guardsman, whose defense was not less vigorous; his death was but the more cruel. A third was cut to pieces before Suleau's turn came.

"There is your Suleau," said a woman to Theroigne.

She did not know him by sight; she thought he was a priest, and scoffed at him as the Abbe Suleau. Like a wild cat, she sprung at his throat. He was young, brave, and lusty; with a fist blow he sent her ten paces off, shook off the men who had seized him, and wrenching a saber from a hand, felled a couple of the assassins.

Then commenced a horrible conflict. Gaining ground toward the door, Suleau cut himself three times free; but he was obliged to turn round to get the cursed door open, and in that instant twenty blades ran through his body. He fell at the feet of Theroigne, who had the cruel joy of inflicting his last wound.

Another escaped, another stoutly resisted, but the rest were butchered like sheep. All the bodies were dragged to Vendome Place, where their heads were struck off and set on poles for a march through the town.

Thus, before the action, blood was spilled in two places; on the City Hall steps and in Feuillants' yard. We shall presently see it flow in the Tuileries; the brook after the rain-drops, the river after the brook.

While this massacre was being perpetrated, about nine A. M., some eleven thousand National Guards, gathered by the alarm-bell of Barbaroux and the drum-beat of Santerre, marched down the St. Antoine ward and came out on the Strand. They wanted the order to assail the Tuileries.

Made to wait for an hour, two stories beguiled them: either concessions were hoped from the court, or the St. Marceau ward was not ready, and they could not fall on without them.

A thousand pikemen waxed restless; as ever, the worst armed wanted to begin the fray. They broke through the ranks of the Guard, saying that they were going to do without them and take the palace.

Some of the Marseilles Federals and a few French Guards – of the same regiments which had stormed the Bastile three years before – took the lead and were acclaimed as chiefs. These were the vanguard of the insurrection.