by Marge Piercy
Mme Vernet and he spent their evenings sitting by her small fire. He read aloud to her from Voltaire or Abbé Raynal’s History of the Two Indies. The French had been forced to loose their hold on the colonies. At least the slave trade had been stopped, not by the Revolution so much as by war. Robespierre would finish it off now that he was in power. Robespierre was a man of principle; only his principles were narrow and his means increasingly ferocious. Death solved all political problems.
Paris was becoming a huge theater. There was the theater of the Convention, where great speeches rumbled and demagogues clashed. There was the theater of the Revolutionary Tribunal, where that terrifying moron Fouquier-Tinville tried people in batches, as he called it, and in batches they went to the guillotine. The guillotine was another theater. How would this or that one die? Final words? The streets were yet another stage, of demonstrations, protests, marches. David regularly mounted mammoth festivals involving music and flowers and bright colors, banners, cannons. The death of Marat seemed to have generated public entertainment for two months. Shut up as he was, he had Mme Vernet bring him papers. He questioned Pierre and Sophie. He tried to understand the upheavals, the transformations, the volte-faces, the abrupt rises and more abrupt falls. People spoke of the Terror. Some evoked it with loathing, some with excitement, some with fanatical hope. “These are the times that try men’s souls,” his friend Tom Paine had written about the American revolution, but that seemed tepid by comparison. Some spoke about the Terror with admiration as if it were a great beast, a thing in itself, instead of a repressive policy instituted by the government. Some wrote of it with religious fervor, as if it would cleanse society, renewal through blood. Some saw it as the Antichrist.
He was writing a history of the human mind, of the perfectibility of society. He divided history into great ages that revealed a pattern. He decided to call it A Sketch of the Intellectual Progress of Mankind. When he gave Sophie a copy of the manuscript as far as he had gotten, she sent a message that she was overjoyed. This was the culmination of his life’s work. He agreed. He had no idea how much time he had. He wrote on with intense concentration, a gift to his daughter so that she would understand her father. He would never embrace the royalists or the reaction. Calmly but swiftly he put his vision down on page after page. A great light seemed to fill him as he worked.
SEVENTY-ONE
Max
(July-October 1793)
MAX had no time for anything superfluous. Everything light and pleasant and casual had burned away. He could not remember what it was like to walk in the sunlight, to dine with his adopted family, to talk with Eléanore, to sleep more than four hours. Often he was up all night and worked the next day. The Revolution was an engine that must be stoked. No one was indispensable, but no one was excused from doing the work placed before him at his full capacity. He found himself finally meshed into the place he was needed, his will the will of the people, himself the brain of a great organism, everything he could summon to give needed, used, combusted. Now he was truly and completely the representative of the people. He moved in a blur of action, yet his mind was clear.
He had come into office in disaster. The great Committee of Public Safety had been Danton’s, but he preferred to play house with his adolescent wife. He had lost interest in governing. Max knew about Danton’s secret religious marriage. An ex-priest told him in confidence, and he kept that confidence one might say religiously. Max smiled at his little joke as he entered that tidbit in his notebook on Danton. Danton was a puzzle: Now a worthy tool of the Revolution. Now a pig wallowing in his domestic sty. He had thought Danton had been ennobled by suffering when he lost his partner for life, Gabrielle, who was such a good mother. Max did not find her attractive-she was too full-bodied and overblown for his aesthetic appreciation-but as a madonna she had shone. Then after Max had opened his heart to Danton, offering him friendship, scarcely five months later, Danton married a child bride and acted as if he had just invented conjugal pleasure. Here was a man with much surface but little center.
He had disreputable friends, as did Camille. Camille was still friendly with the royalist Dillon; both of them dined with financiers, speculators, the underbelly of the rich class determined to make money from the Revolution. People gossiped about the settlement Danton had fixed on his new bride. He seemed to have bought her, and dearly. Lucile was surrounded by a cloud of scandal. She flirted with everyone. Max believed her faithful, but he did not believe that of Camille, who had always fallen into bed with anyone who crooked a finger at him. Max tried to ignore that sexual morass. Orgies and affairs were sordid but did little damage to the State. But financial chicanery was what the English relied upon to undermine the paper money, to wreck confidence in the fiscal stability of the revolutionary government. Money was a powerful lever to overthrow a government. He hoped that Camille and Danton were more honest than they appeared. Lucile spent money like water. She had none of the frugal virtues of the Duplays. She was elegant when she should have been simple. What was needed was a single will. Whatever did not cleave to the Revolution must be excised like a cancer. The internal enemies were no different from the armies at the borders or the English cutting them off at sea.
Some things had been accomplished. The Constitution had passed overwhelmingly, but they could not put it into effect in the present emergency. For the peasants, he had pushed land reform through the Convention: All feudal dues and obligations abolished without compensation, and land made available for collective purchase by communities.
Every morning he rose, breakfasted with the Duplays-often the only time he got to see them, and then went along the street toward the Tuileries. Sometimes he would run into Carnot, who lived nearby, and they would walk together.
Lazare Carnot was the military man on the Committee of Public Safety. Older than the rest and a talented engineer, he had come up as far as a commoner could under the ancien régime. Max had known him in Arras. He was a big man with a long sharp nose and deep-set eyes, a laconic manner. As they passed, children were already playing in the gardens. The Committee used the entrance from the courtyard. He climbed what had been called the Queen’s Stairway. Every morning as he climbed that stairway, he was forced to think of Marie-Antoinette. The fury created by Charlotte Corday had spilt over onto Marie. Everyone agreed, women were getting out of control, running wild like mischievous children, like savages. That too must be put in order.
At the head of the steps was a series of connecting rooms crowded with messengers, functionaries, petitioners, clerks carrying papers to be signed, officers, sans-culottes with something urgent to say, couriers from all over the country, would-be contractors for the army or the battered navy. He passed through the midst. The last room housed the Committee, which had the right to meet in closed session. He no longer noticed Persian carpets or parquet floors, mirrors, chandeliers dripping crystal, dancing goddesses. He saw only the large oval table covered with green baize where the Committee met and the desks and tables scattered around the room. By Saint-Just’s table was a camp bed where he often slept. Couthon was wheeled in by his wife. “Here am I, the Nimble One, who overslept ten minutes from dancing all night.”
Barère was finishing up paperwork before heading for the Convention. Max did not trust him, handsome, florid, always seeming to pose for a portrait. Barère tacked to every wind. He was slippery and oily, indispensable at present because he was popular. He was the person who made little jokes as they worked late into the night around the green table. He made light of their quick suppers of dry bread and wine with a bit of sausage or an apple. He was even more important in dealing with the Convention. He took the day’s victories and made them sing and dance across the floor of the theater where the Convention met. He made bad poetry of war, and the delegates adored him. Saint-Just would report that the men had broken ranks and been cut down by cannon fire. Barère would invent a heroic stand to the last man with the tricolor bravely fluttering, men dying with a last word f
or mother.
Carnot dealt with military matters and dealt firmly. Finally someone who knew about the army was giving orders and following up. No more boots whose soles fell off; no more bread rotten with weevils. No more blankets that rotted in the damp. Things were on an honest footing at last. Another entry in the notebook labeled DANTON. He had been in bed with the contractors. Fabre d’Églantine and Danton had much to answer for from their lucrative sojourn in Belgium.
Several of the Committee were always on mission, running all over France bringing the edicts of the Convention, making sure that the work of local government was just and revolutionary, that no demagogues got into power, the war effort was proceeding, the peasants were bringing their grain to market. Saint-Just went to the army often. He was tireless, not able to be bribed, moved, cajoled. Max also sent Augustin and Elisabeth’s husband Philippe Lebas on a mission. Max was justly proud of his kid brother.
“You should be married like Philippe,” he said one day as they grabbed a quick meal before heading off to the Jacobins. Max went regularly, no matter what the press of business. The Jacobins usually adjourned by ten, and he could still rush back to the Tuileries for a late meeting.
“None of us will marry,” Augustin said. He was handsome, Max thought, an open masculine face. “Not me, not Charlotte, not you.”
“I can’t offer a wife anything but death. But you, Augustin, you’d make a wonderful father. Charlotte? She has no politics but vanity.”
“We’re all the children of our mother who died screaming, after that pig stuffed her full of too many babies and took off. I’m told he’s in Germany.”
“To me, he’s dead,” Max said. “That’s all I want to hear on the subject.”
Augustin shrugged. “Charlotte drives me crazy. Every time I get involved with a woman, she becomes insanely jealous…. I like a nice married woman who’s separated from her husband. Or a widow. Really, why don’t you marry Eléanore? Everybody knows about her.”
“I have too little time, Bonbon. In two years, there won’t be ten of us alive who made the Revolution.”
“You need to get more sleep. Relax. Maybe we could steal a day in the country, while the weather’s warm.”
September came tramping in, crowds of sans-culottes in the streets again waving banners and pikes and shouting. The paper money kept falling in value. Efforts to provide a secure supply of bread at a reasonable price failed. There were long, long lines at the bakers, at the grocers. The people were sure that speculators, hoarders, middle men were forcing up the prices. The Mad Dogs stirred them up with violent rhetoric, claiming the mantle of Marat. Those young agitators infuriated him. They had no respect. Leclerc dared jump up in the Jacobins and scream, “If new men seem too passionate, that’s because the old men are worn out. Only the young have the fire to carry the Revolution forward!”
Max had him thrown out. How dare they speak for the people, these loudmouths? The so-called red priest Jacques Roux. That young idiot Leclerc. Billaud-Varenne and that actor, Collot d’Herbois. All of them in bed with those wild women of the RRW. Hébert’s lewd rag had the largest circulation in France. Hébert was entrenched in the Commune and leading the Cordeliers Club, which had gotten away from Danton. Danton should have kept a grip on the Cordeliers, as Max never, never relaxed his vigilance over the Jacobins. You needed to keep your base. Hébert was building a base; Hébert was challenging him. The Mad Dogs were as dangerous as the right, because they could split the Revolution. The peasants were pleased by Max’s land reform; the Vendée showed what happened when you didn’t please the peasants. Now he must satisfy the sans-culottes.
Those Mad Dogs would lose the Revolution by scaring the middle class. The coalition of the poor and middle class had to be kept intact, the alliance on which the power of the Mountain rested. He must move against the Mad Dogs when he could, but for now he accumulated information. He would adopt enough of their program to cut the ground from under them.
He sat down at the green baize table, placing a notebook before him. “We must have price controls on foods here and in the provinces.”
Barère said, “The shopkeepers, the market women, the distributors won’t like that.”
“We’ll raise wages and then we’ll put on controls. That will please the people. Marat said, ‘Feed the poor before anything,’ and we will.”
“That demagogue Billaud-Varenne wants a revolutionary army,” Carnot said. “Now the sections are demanding one. Utter chaos.”
“Not necessarily. We’ll send them to the Vendée. They’ll be fighting peasants and priests.”
Carnot frowned. “The Vendée peasants are great unconventional fighters. They know their country. They know how to attack and vanish.”
“It’s an experiment. If the revolutionary army doesn’t work out, we’ll disband them,” Saint-Just said. “If they work, we’ll fold them into the regular army.” He did not add what he had said earlier to Max, that it they were wiped out, it would be easier to govern Paris.
“Excellent,” Max said. “Now we must add to the Committee a couple of the agitators.” He turned to Couthon. “Say we need more men to share the work of the Committee. Propose the men we want.”
They settled on Billaud-Varenne and Collot d’Herbois. The people loved Billaud for demanding a revolutionary army of sans-culottes and proposing that any defeated general should be killed. He had a reputation for ruthlessness. Collot d’Herbois of the Cordeliers was close to the Mad Dogs, close to Hébert, close to that actress who led the RRW. People said they had been lovers. The Convention added Danton, who declined, pleading ill health. He asked for a leave of absence to retire to Arcis to regain his strength. Danton was withdrawing from politics. Max was amused that Danton knew the moment to step down.
To Eléanore in one of the precious moments they could be alone, lying face to face fully clothed on his bed, he said, “It’s like being married to twelve men. A marriage of convenience. I would not choose them-”
“Except perhaps Saint-Just.” Eléanore was sometimes jealous of him.
“Twelve men do not make a good marriage, but the volume of work forces us to march over our differences, to crash through what we dislike about each other. It doesn’t matter I consider Billaud a cutthroat and Collot a demagogue and Barère a weathercock. We are the Committee. We must save France. Nothing else signifies. We’ll die to save France as clearly as soldiers must.”
She held him tightly, her face intense, her grip hard. “Won’t you be disappointed if you survive this period of crisis, retire covered with glory and have to deal with me?”
“Then I’d dare to marry you. We’ll move out of Paris. Trees and clean air, clear water, and many dogs. We’ll take the stray dogs of Paris with us. Blount will be a patriarch.” Blount, sprawled across the foot of the bed, wagged his tail at the mention of his name and eyed his master. Max hardly even got to walk Blount lately. Eléanore took care of him.
“I want to believe in that future.”
“Danton is retiring to the country with his child bride.”
“Good riddance. Max, I never told you this. But that time we all were in the country together, Danton tried to seduce Elisabeth. If you can call it that. He put his hands all over her. Elisabeth screamed and ran away-”
“Why did the two of you keep this from me? Does Philippe know?”
“I doubt it. Elisabeth made me promise not to tell. She was embarrassed. She was afraid she had somehow given him encouragement. I hate keeping secrets from you. Now that he’s leaving Paris, I see no reason not to let you know.”
“I wish you had told me at the time. I will not forgive this.”
“It doesn’t matter, Max. Nothing happened.”
They rarely made love now. He was too exhausted. He assured her that he did not care for her less. He had nothing left inside.
At the Committee, they were dealing with economic problems, with the war that was going better against the Austrians than in the Vendée. Lyon, wh
ere the Girondins had massacred the Jacobins, was under siege. The Girondins had a lot to answer for.
Before he could move against the Girondins, the Revolutionary Tribunal summoned Marie-Antoinette, the focus of Hébert’s rage. Max did not consider her dangerous, for she could not rule. Max stepped in when Hébert was pushing the charge of incest. That confused child, the Dauphin, had been taken from his mother. Then he was coerced into claiming Marie-nette had seduced him. Rubbish! Max demanded they stop that nonsense.
The damage was done in the Tribunal and in Hébert’s rag, before Max caught wind of the trumped-up farce. Max lost his temper, briefly, then he settled into a cold fury. Hébert was becoming dangerous. The ex-Queen went to her death, crowds heckling her all the way to the guillotine. Max thought the spectacle unnecessary. Billaud went to watch. No one else did. It was reported there was dancing in the streets. Hébert devoted a special issue of his paper to gloating. The Committee, along with their sometime rivals, the Committee of Security, took the Revolutionary Tribunal away from the Paris Commune. They wanted to control trials and executions.
Nothing could be done yet to Hébert, who controlled the Cordeliers and the Commune. But it was time to move against the Mad Dogs, Leclerc, Jacques Roux, the RRW women: Hébert’s allies. Billaud and Collot liked their new power and would go along. Putting them on the great Committee had been a clever move. It was a long, exhausting and dangerous chess game he was playing against history and opponents who kept multiplying. But he held everything in his hands.
SEVENTY-TWO
Pauline
(Fall 1793)
PAULINE felt personally betrayed by Robespierre. She had adored him. She had cheered him on. She had defended him in public and private, most recently to Jacques Roux. She risked her life in demonstrations Robespierre called (but never marched in). She had been content that he was the brain and she was one of many bodies. She felt a sense of unity with him, that he understood the people of the sections, that he would lead the way they passionately wanted to go. When he stood up in the Convention or the Jacobins, he spoke as the Revolution, with an icy passion that seemed empty of self-interest. Although he spoke often of himself, the self he spoke of belonged to the people, to her.