“I do. The English system by which they are chosen from the members of the National Assembly, sit with it, debate with it and are responsible to it, is so obviously the right one. Any other is sheer madness; for, if the Ministers are to remain outside it, as at present, they are debarred all opportunity to assess the feeling of the Assembly, and reduced to no more than ill-informed private advisers to the King. Yet an overwhelming majority of the deputies are so hypnotised by the dogmatic doctrines of Montesquieu and Rousseau—that the separation of the executive and legislative powers is a first essential for the maintenance of liberty—that I greatly fear we shall have to submit to that farcical form of Government.”
“We will fight it, though!” declared de Mirabeau truculently; and, although his black eyes were dimmed by ophthalmia from overwork, they flashed as he spoke. “I regard it as imperative that the King’s Ministers should be drawn from the Chamber yet retain their seats in it. Where else can he find men capable of governing France? Necker, Montmorin, and the rest of his present crew are all men of straw. In fact the Queen is the only man the King has about him.”
He paused for a moment, then went on to describe in glowing phrases the type of Minister he thought the King should have; naively enumerating one after another all his own qualities. De Périgord caught Roger’s eye, waited until de Mirabeau had done, then remarked with gentle irony:
“Mon ami. You forgot one thing. Such a man should also be marked with the small-pox.”
De Mirabeau took the jest in good part, roared with laughter, and said: “Well, the King might do worse. If he would only give me the chance I would save the monarchy for him.”
All too soon for Roger, the coach he had ordered to fetch him was announced; but true to his engagement with de Périgord he excused himself and left the two great men together.
Having had his true business guessed by de Périgord had shaken him badly, and for most of the way back to Paris he took serious thought about the possibility of other people unmasking him. On the whole it seemed unlikely, as not only was the Bishop a man of exceptional shrewdness but he also had had information about “Monsieur le Chevalier de Breuc’s” antecedents that no one else in Paris possessed. The disquieting episode had, however, served to call Roger’s attention to an important development he had overlooked.
Up to the preceding August it had been good enough cover to pose as a young Englishman of means who was travelling for pleasure and liked to spend a good part of his time in Paris, as there had been many such; but it was so no longer. The riots culminating in the fall of the Bastille, the “Great Fear”, and finally the removal of the Court from Versailles, had driven the rich English milor’s to take their pleasures in the German and Italian cities. Most of their friends among the French nobility had fled, and, as the gay Duke of Dorset had gone home, this winter there were not even any elegant thés-dansant to attend at the British Embassy.
After some thought, Roger decided to adopt a new line. He would gradually put it about that he was staying on in Paris because he had taken up journalism, and was now writing a weekly news-letter. For the paper in which these mythical articles were to be published he chose the Morning Chronicle, as that was the most important Whig organ of the day and would sound well with the majority of his French acquaintances, as most of them were men of Liberal opinions.
However, in spite of that unnerving moment when de Périgord had blandly charged him with being an agent of Mr. Pitt, he felt that he had had an extremely fortunate day; as not only did his secret alliance with the Bishop hold great possibilities for the future, but de Mirabeau had promised to introduce him to a Club called the Jacobins, which was beginning to assume considerable importance on the political stage.
Three nights later Roger dined in very different company. He had continued to see the Comte de la Marck occasionally when visiting the Tuileries or about the city, and in the previous week the young Austrian had asked him to dine at his Embassy, where he was still living.
During the past six months fashions in Paris had undergone a greater alteration than in the whole of the preceding sixty years. Silk coats, satin breeches, gold lace and feathers were now regarded as the outward symbols of an inward desire to arrest the march of Liberty; so few men any longer wore them in the streets or had their hair powdered before going out in the evening. But, realising that the Embassy was Austrian soil, and that few changes were likely to have occurred there, Roger had his hair powdered for the first time since leaving Naples, put a patch on his chin, and went out to dine clad in his best satins and laces.
When he arrived he was pleased to find that he had done the right thing, as the party consisted of a dozen people and it was being conducted with all the courtly formality that only such a little time ago had been the fashion, yet in Paris already seemed of a bygone age. Even for this small gathering, hundreds of candles lit the great chandeliers in the hall and above the staircase; a string band played softly behind a screen of palms; black-clad major-domos, with silver chains about their necks, and a line of rigid footmen stood ready on either side of the entrance doors to take the wraps of the guests.
The Ambassador, Count Florimond de Mercy-Argenteau, was himself receiving. Roger knew him well by sight but had never before spoken to him, so he was pleasurably surprised when the elderly diplomat returned his bow with the words: “Monsieur le Chevalier, I know you to be a friend of the Queen; so I hope you will permit me to make you one of mine, and to assure you that you will always find a very warm welcome here.”
As Roger thanked him and turned to greet de la Marck, he wondered if the Queen had told Mercy-Argenteau of his journeys on her behalf to Florence and Naples, and thought it highly probable that she had. The Ambassador had represented Austria at the Court of Versailles for over twenty years; so from Madame Marie Antoinette’s arrival there as a child-bride of fourteen he had been her counsellor and champion, and had come to be regarded by her almost as though he was a favourite uncle.
De la Marck presented Roger to the Spanish Ambassador, the Conde Fernanunez and his Condesa; then to the charming old Abbé de Vermond, who shared with Mercy-Argenteau the distinction of being the Queen’s oldest friend in France; for he had been sent to Vienna to teach her French when her marriage had first been mooted and, returning to Versailles, in her entourage, had continued as her preceptor until she left the schoolroom.
But Roger broke away from the group as soon as politeness permitted, for he had seen an old friend on the far side of the room. It was Count Hans Axel Fersen, who had entertained him most hospitably when he was in Sweden two summers earlier.
The Swedish nobleman was a tall good-looking man in his middle thirties, and all the world knew the story of how he met the Queen when she was Dauphine, and they were both still in their teens, at a masked ball at the Opera. Fersen had himself admitted to Roger that he had fallen in love with the beautiful Princess, and later gone to fight in the American War in an endeavour to forget her; but everyone who knew the Queen’s character discredited the story that he had actually been her lover, just as they did of those concerning innumerable other men—including even the old Abbé de Vermond—with whom the gutter pamphleteers never tired of coupling her name.
Fersen was delighted to see Roger again, and when they compared notes both were a little surprised that they had not run across one another during the past few months, as Count Hans said that after revisiting France in the autumn of ’88 he had returned there permanently the previous summer. But that they had not met was explained by Roger’s journeys, and the fact that Fersen spent much of his time at Valenciennes with a French regiment of which the Queen had procured him the Colonelcy.
The round dozen in the party was made up by ladies, and Roger was allotted to take in to dinner a niece of the Ambassador who happened to be staying in the Embassy for a few nights on her way through Paris. After he had talked to her for a while he turned to his other neighbour, who was the Condesa Fernanunez, and she asked him if he n
umbered any Spaniards among his acquaintance.
For a second he hesitated. Since leaving Naples he had stuck to his resolution to discipline himself against thinking of Isabella, and, although the temptation to do so had proved too much for him at times, he had at least succeeded in banishing her image from his brain except when some special occurrence reminded him of her. This was just such a chance occurrence; and it suddenly struck him that, since the opportunity offered, it would be a good test of his progress to talk about her now and see if he could get to sleep that night without suffering his old tormenting longings. So he replied:
“I had the good furtune to form a most sincere friendship early last summer with a lady of your country, Madame; and I should be much surprised if you do not know her. She is the daughter of General Count d’Aranda.”
“But of course!” exclaimed the Condesa. “A most charming and sweet-natured creature. I knew her well; for when her father was succeeded as Ambassador here by my husband he left her in my care. Naturally, as she was one of Madame Marie Antoinette’s ladies, Her Majesty was formally responsible for her well-being, but I assumed towards her the role of a benevolent aunt. I do not remember, though, her ever mentioning you to me.”
Roger explained that while he had been presented to Isabella by the Queen at Fontainebleau, he had not come to know her at all well until chance decreed that he should act as her escort on the greater part of her journey south to Marseilles. He refrained from any mention of her having accompanied him to Florence, or their having met again more recently in Naples; but he was under no necessity to pursue the subject himself, as the Condesa proved to be a garrulous lady and talked for quite a time, first in praise of Isabella, then about her marriage. As a dinner-table topic the subject seemed near exhausted, when she added:
“I heard of her through a mutual friend only last week. It seems that her marriage was swiftly blessed. She is expecting a child towards the end of March, so she and her husband are leaving Naples to return to Spain in the New Year.”
“Why should they do that, Madame?” Roger enquired, not seeing any connection between the two statements.
The Condesa smiled at him. “Naturally they must be hoping that it will be a boy, and whenever an heir is born to a noble Spanish family a great fiesta is given on the father’s estates. Even if it is a girl many bulls will be slaughtered and casks of wine broached. At such a time the lord and his lady always repair to the family’s ancestral home, so that after the lying-in they may witness the rejoicings of their serfs. It will prove a good opportunity, too, for the Sidonia y Ulloas to make their court to our new King and Queen; so no doubt when Isabella is safely delivered they will spend some months in Madrid. That will be pleasant for her, as she has not been in the capital since she was quite a young girl, and there must be many of her relatives …”
For several moments longer the Condesa rattled on, but Roger was listening to her with only half an ear. His hands had gone clammy at the awful thought of Isabella in the agony of childbirth and he was wishing desperately that he could be near her at the time to give her at least the comfort of his love during her ordeal.
Automatically he continued to make polite conversation until the ladies left the table. When they had gone the dozen footmen, one of whom had waited behind each chair during the meal, the two wine butlers and the major-domo, silently withdrew. As the doors closed behind the last of the servants the Ambassador beckoned Roger up to a vacant place near the head of the table, and only then did he manage to thrust Isabella out of his mind.
The conversation of the six men at once turned to politics and, in particular, the situation of the Queen. Roger felt certain now that he had been asked only because de Mercy-Argenteau knew of his journeys and felt that he was entirely to be trusted, as they began to talk with complete frankness of ways and means to save her should another emergency arise in which her life was threatened.
It struck Roger as interesting that the old Abbé was the only Frenchman present; but it occurred to him that, since so many Frenchmen were now being torn between two loyalties, it might have been decided that it was wiser to keep them out of it, and that an exception had been made in the Abbé’s case only because, in the role of a father confessor, he would never be denied access to the Queen, however closely she might be guarded. Roger hazarded a guess, too, that de Mercy-Argenteau’s reluctance to take Frenchmen into his counsels was probably the reason why, on de la Marck’s recommendation, he should have been singled out for the honour of inclusion in such a company.
It soon emerged that although Count Axel Fersen held no official diplomatic status, he had come to France as the secret representative of King Gustavus III, charged to do everything in his power to aid the Queen. The Spanish Ambassador had also been instructed by his King to take all possible steps to succour and protect the French Royal Family. Both were of the opinion that while the prisoners of the Tuileries still had some degree of liberty they should leave the capital on the pretext of a Royal Hunt, and when the carriages were well out in the open country order them to be driven to Compiègne, Rheims or Metz, at any one of which they could swiftly surround themselves with the Army.
Roger had naturally refrained from putting any view forward during the early part of the discussion; but now he said: “Such a scheme would be well enough if you could rely upon the loyalty of the Army. But can you do so? From all I hear the rate of desertion has been appallingly high in the past few months, and in many of the regiments the men who remain will no longer take orders from their officers.”
“That is true in many areas,” agreed Count Hans. “But the Army of the East is still mainly loyal. General de Bouillé has some good troops under him, and I can vouch for my own regiment. It was in order to make certain of its dependability for just such an emergency that I spent so much time with it this summer and autumn.”
“Messieurs, I too should be in favour of such a plan, did I not know it to be impractical,” announced de Mercy-Argenteau. He spoke with the German accent that he had never quite lost, and went on heavily: “To do as you suggest would mean civil war, and we shall never bring the King to face that. Quite apart from his morbid horror of bloodshed, he is obsessed with the example of the Great Rebellion in England, and he maintains that the unhappy Charles I would never have lost his head had he not taken up arms against his subjects.”
“There may be some truth in that,’ remarked the Spaniard. “In any case there appears to be little danger of Louis XVI losing his head as long as he remains in Paris.”
“I agree, Excellency,” the Austrian nodded. “For the King’s life we fortunately have no reason to concern ourselves. It is for the life of the little Arch-Duchess who was entrusted to me as a child that I am so gravely perturbed. The hand of God has already saved her from more than one attempt upon her life, and it is known to me that others are maturing. Her enemies are well aware that it is her courage alone that stands between them and the achievement of their evil designs, and they are seeking to poison her. She now dare eat nothing but the plainest food prepared for her by her own attendants, and the sugar she keeps in her bedroom to make eau sucré at night has twice been tampered with, so that Madame Campan now has to keep a secret supply for her.”
“Then,” said Fersen, with an anxious frown, “we must get Her Majesty away. And with the minimum possible delay.”
The Abbé Vermond sadly shook his head. “Alas, Monsieur, she will not leave the King, I am convinced of that.”
“Somehow, we must find means to persuade her. She would perhaps if we could bring her to believe that the Dauphin’s life was in danger, and that it was essential that she should escape with him.”
De Mercy-Argenteau gave a swift glance under his grey eyebrows at Roger; then, as Roger remained silent, he said: “Her Majesty made a plan some time ago to send the Dauphin to Naples, but the King refused his consent to the project. She then had no thought of going with her son, and even if the King changes his mind I greatly do
ubt if she could be persuaded to do so.”
“I am certain that she could not, Excellency,” declared the Abbé. “She is a convinced fatalist, and with superb courage has already made up her mind to face some tragic end that she believes Fate has in store for her. She is a religious woman as we all know, but even her acceptance of the fundamental goodness of God is insufficient to overcome her conviction that destiny has marked her down. And one cannot deny that there have been portents enough in her life to give her reason for that black thought.”
The Abbé paused for a moment, then went on: “We have but to recall the terrible tempest that raged upon the night of her marriage. A wind so great that the park at Versailles was devastated; mighty oaks rent in twain by lightning; the windows of her bridal chamber blown in, their shutters battered to matchwood, and the gale howling in the room so that the very coverlets were blown from the bed. Then a fortnight later the public celebrations for her marriage in Paris. I shall never forget how we set out from Versailles to witness the great display of fireworks that had been arranged. That beautiful child, so gay, so happy, so excited; and when we arrived the vast sea of people who had assembled to do her homage, cheering and throwing flowers as she smiled and blew kisses to them standing up in her carriage.
“Then the rocket accidentally igniting the pile of wood, the flames reaching the powder barrels before the firemen could get to them; the terrible explosion, the crowd stampeding, the cheers turning to screams of agony, the hundreds of people trampled to death, and the number of injured so great that it was beyond the capacity of the hospitals to take them.”
Again the Abbé paused, then he looked up at de Mercy-Argenteau. “And above all, Your Excellency, you and I are old enough to remember the day she was born. November the 2nd, 1755. On it there was the most frightful disaster that has afflicted Europe for centuries: the Lisbon earthquake. No Princess has ever had a more inauspicious omen at her birth; so can one wonder that she has always felt the hand of Fate to be upon her?”
The Rising Storm Page 47