The marquis moved from group to group, equally at home with all, chatting lightly with the courtiers, whispering gravely with the elders, or discussing with the tone of the man of the world the views and opinions of the deputies. Victor de Gisons was constantly at the house, and strove by his cheerfulness and gaiety to dissipate the shade of melancholy which still hung over Marie.
Towards the end of July the Marquis de St. Caux and the little body of royalists who still remained faithful to the king became more and more anxious; the position of the royal family was now most precarious; most of the troops in Paris had been sent to the frontier, and those left behind were disorganized and ready to join the mob. Two out of the three Swiss battalions had been sent away and but one remained at the Tuileries. Of the National Guard only the battalion of Filles St. Thomas and part of the battalion of the Saints Pares could be trusted to defend the king. The rest were opposed to him, and would certainly join the populace.
On the 14th of July a large number of National Guards from the provinces had arrived in Paris; and the battalion from Marseilles, the most violent of all, had, immediately that it arrived in the city, come into collision with one of the loyal battalions.
The royalists were wholly without organization, their sole aim being to defend the king should he be in danger, and if necessary to die by his side.
On the evening before the 10th of August the tocsin was heard to sound and the drums to beat to arms. All day there had been sinister rumours circulating, but the king had sent privately to his friends that the danger was not imminent and that he had no need of them; however, as soon as the alarm sounded the marquis snatched up a sword and prepared to start for the palace. He embraced his wife, who was calm but very pale, and his children. Ernest asked to be allowed to go with him, but the marquis said:
"No, my son,, my life is the king's; but yours at present is due to your mother and sisters."
It was twenty-four hours before he returned. His clothes were torn, his head was bound up, and one of his arms disabled. The marquise gave a cry of delight as he entered. No one had slept since he left, for every hour fresh rumours of fighting had arrived, and the sound of cannon and musketry had been heard in the early part of the day.
"It is all over, wife!" he said. "We have done our best, but the king will do nothing. We cannot say we have lost the battle, for we have never tried to win it; but it would be the same thing in the long run."
Before hearing what had passed the marquise insisted upon her husband taking refreshment and having his wounds bound up and attended to. When he had finished his meal the marquis began:
"We had a good deal of difficulty in getting into the Tuileries, for the National Guard tried to prevent our passing. However, we most of us got through; and we found that there were about a hundred assembled, almost all men of family. The Marshal de Mailly led us into the king's apartment.
"'Sire,' he said, 'here are your faithful nobles, eager to replace your majesty on the throne of your ancestors.' The National Guard in the palace withdrew at once, leaving us alone with the Swiss.
"We formed in the courtyard; and the king, with his hat in his hand, walked down our ranks and those of the Swiss. He seemed without fear, but he did not speak a word, and did nothing to encourage us. Several of our party, in trying to make their way to the palace, had been murdered, and the mob cut off their heads and put them on pikes; and these were paraded in the streets within sight of the windows. Roederer, the procureur-general of the department of Paris, came to the king and pressed him to leave the Tuileries.
"'There are not five minutes to lose, sire,' he said. 'There is no safety for your majesty but in the National Assembly.'
"The queen resisted; but upon Roederer saying that an enormous crowd with cannon were coming, and that delay would endanger the lives of the whole of the royal family, he went. But he thought of us, and asked what was to become of us. Roederer said that, as we were not in uniform, by leaving our swords behind us we could pass through the crowd without being recognized. The king moved on, followed by the queen, Madam Elizabeth, and the children. The crowd, close and menacing, lined the passage, and the little procession made their way with difficulty to the Assembly.
"We remained in the palace, and every moment the throng around became more and more numerous. The cannon they brought were turned against us. The first door was burst open, the Swiss did not fire, the populace poured in and mixed with us and the soldiers. Some one fired a gun. Whether it was one of the Swiss or one of the mob I know not, but the fight began. The Swiss in good order marched down the staircase, drove out the mob, seized the cannon the Marseillais had brought, and turning them upon their assailants opened fire. The mob fled in terror, and I believe that one battalion would have conquered all the scum of Paris, had not the king, at the sound of the first shot, sent word to the Swiss to cease firing. They obeyed, and although the mob kept firing upon them from the windows, the great part of them marched calm, and without returning a shot, to the Assembly, where, at the order of the king, they laid down their arms and were shut up in the church of the Feuillants.
"A portion of the Swiss had remained on guard in the Tuileries when the main body marched away. The instant the palace was undefended the mob burst in. Every Swiss was murdered, as well as many of the servants of the queen. The mob sacked the palace and set it on fire. When the Swiss left we had one by one made our way oua by a back entrance, but most of us were recognized by the mob and were literally cut to pieces. I rushed into a house when assaulted, and, slamming the door behind me, made my way out by the back and so escaped them, getting off with only these two wounds; then I hurried to a house of a friend, whom I had seen murdered before my eyes, but his servants did not know of it, and they allowed me to remain there till dark, and you see here I am."
"But what has happened at the Assembly and where is the king?" the marquise asked, after the first exclamation of horror at the tale they had heard.
"The king and his family are prisoners in the Temple," the marquis said. "The Commune has triumphed over the Assembly and a National Convention is to be the supreme power. The king's functions are suspended, but as he has not ruled for the last three years that will make little difference. A new ministry has been formed with Danton, Lebrun, and some of the Girondists. He and his family are handed over to the care of the Commune, and their correspondence is to be intercepted. A revolutionary tribunal has been constituted, when, I suppose, the farce of trying men whose only crime is loyalty to the king is to be carried out.
"We must be prepared, my love, to face the worst. Escape is now impossible, and, indeed, so long as the king and queen are alive I would not quit Paris; but we must prepare for sending the children away if possible."
CHAPTER V
The Outburst
"Monsieur le Marquis," M. du Tillet exclaimed, hurrying into the salon, in which the marquis with his family were sitting, on the evening of the 21st of August, "I hear that it is rumoured in the street that all the members of noble families are to be arrested."
The room was lit up as if to receive company, but the crowd which had thronged it a fortnight before were gone. The Girondists had first withdrawn, then the nobles had begun to fall off, for it had become dangerous for them to show themselves in the streets, where they were liable to be insulted and attacked by the mob. Moreover, any meeting of known Royalists was regarded with suspicion by the authorities, and so gradually the gatherings had become smaller and smaller.