The Man who Killed the King

by Dennis Wheatley

  As Roger had met Pétion at the Jacobin Club two years earlier, he could imagine the scene. The ex-deputy, now Mayor of Paris, was vain, stupid and brutal. His coarse good looks were spoiled by corpulence and by a receding forehead that sloped back to a fringe of thick, frizzy hair. He was a friend of Robespierre’s and was just as pitiless, so it was easy to imagine his taking every advantage of his situation to show malice and rudeness to the prisoners. Barnave, his thin face flushing, added a few touches to the picture:

  “Except at night, we took our meals in the Berlin. Every time we ate he belched in the faces of the ladies, and he frequently spat on the floor of the carriage. Once he took the Dauphin on his knee and amused himself with winding the child’s curls round his finger so tightly that the little boy cried out in pain. The Queen snatched her son from him; had she not, I would have struck him for his cruelty and insolence.”

  “And this ordeal lasted four days?”

  “Yes; for three of which I was the unhappy witness of their torment. The nearer we came to Paris the bigger and more menacing became the mob. On more than one occasion I feared that we would never get our prisoners to the capital alive. The heat and dust were terrible, and the Royal Family were already half dead from exhaustion. When we did reach the Champs Elysée it was a sea of people, and the Berlin could move only at a snail’s pace owing to the additional weight of a score of sans-culottes who had clambered on to its roof and boot. When at last we reached the Tuileries the three Gardes du Corps were dragged from the box and it required my utmost efforts to prevent their being massacred. From start to finish the journey was a nightmare impossible to describe, and the conduct of the people for whose liberties I had fought was so utterly disgusting that I was within an ace of abandoning public life for good, there and then. I should have done so but for my sympathy with those two brave royal women, with whom a duty for which I was selected by chance had so unexpectedly brought me into such close and prolonged contact.”

  Roger nodded. “Three days’ confinement in a travelling coach gives ample opportunity to get to know one’s companions.”

  “It certainly did in my case. When Pétion and I entered the Berlin our feelings were, I imagine, somewhat similar. I felt that the King had betrayed his people by attempting to fly abroad; that he had been incited to the attempt by his scheming, unscrupulous wife; that they had earned contempt and deserved public reprimand; and that it was for us to maintain a frigid dignity throughout the journey, thereby displaying our disapproval of their act and at the same time armouring ourselves against the hatred of us that it seemed certain they would not seek to hide. But they displayed no animosity whatsoever. Instead, with the same natural politeness as if it had been a social occasion, they readily made room for us, apologised for the Berlin being so crowded, gave us cushions to make us more comfortable, and insisted on sharing their food and wine with us because we had none ourselves. No one but a baboon like Pétion could possibly have remained churlish in the face of such civilities, and when Madame Elizabeth began to talk politics with me it was only natural that I should put to her the Assembly’s point of view.”

  “I was under the impression that she occupied herself almost entirely with religion,” Roger remarked, “and knew little of mundane affairs.”

  “You are right in supposing that the teachings of Christianity dominate all her thoughts. She is a saint if ever there was one, and purity actually seems to radiate from her. But she is far from lacking a sense of humour, and has a shrewd mind and wide knowledge. She argued well that her brother, having given liberty to his people, should at least be free to go from place to place about his kingdom as he wished. It was only later that the Queen joined in our conversation.

  “In due course she told me of her coming to France, of the difficulties she had met with at the old King’s Court, of the appalling ignorance of herself and her husband when they came to the throne as two very young people, and of how badly advised the King had been by his Ministers. She said how hard they had striven to meet the wishes of the people by giving way to every fresh demand, even at times against their better judgment, and cited many examples. She complained of nothing, except that an unreasonable restraint had been placed upon their liberty; then sadly remarked how greatly in the past two years she had missed her garden and model farm out at the Trianon. And I had only to witness the way in which her children, her husband, and the few retainers who still remained with them behaved towards her to see how greatly she was beloved by them all.”

  Barnave paused for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders. “Well, I fell in love with her; I could not help myself. To my dying day nothing will now convince me that she was ever guilty of any evil intent. Her dignity, her sweetness, her courage and her forbearance won me completely. There is nothing I would not do for her.”

  Roger had worked hard to get his companion’s mind into a condition specially receptive to certain ideas, and he now felt that he had achieved his object. Fascinated as he had been by this first-hand account of the Royal Family’s abortive attempt to escape, he would never have given up a precious hour to listening to it in the present circumstances had he not had a definite purpose in so doing. While they were eating their meal he had deliberately led Barnave on to talk of it, in order to arouse his memories of that unique experience and to revive the emotions he had felt at the time. In addition, during the telling of the tale Roger had succeeded in most skilfully reorienting Barnave’s ideas about his own past, and had provided a logical reason for now presenting himself as a champion of the Queen.

  Pushing aside the empty plate that lay in front of him, he leaned forward and said, “What of the King? Did you succeed in winning his trust while you were privately advising him?”

  “I think so. It was certainly not personal distrust that caused him to reject my advice; he failed to follow it only because he lacked the courage to resist the popular pressure that was being brought upon him.”

  “And the Queen?”

  “She knows my devotion to her, and that nothing could ever induce me to advise her against what I believed to be her best interests.”

  “You said just now that there is nothing you would not do for her. Does that mean that you would be prepared to risk your life on her behalf?”

  “It does.”

  Roger leaned still further forward, and said in a whisper, “That is all I wish to know. I require your help in getting her and her family out of Paris tonight.”

  CHAPTER VII

  TOUJOURS L’AUDACE

  “You cannot be serious!” Barnave exclaimed, jerking himself back from the table.

  “I was never more serious in my life,” Roger assured him.

  “You tell me that you arrived in Paris only yesterday. How can you possibly have found time to concoct a plan and make all the elaborate arrangements necessary to such an attempt?”

  “As yet I have made no arrangements, and so far my plan is based only on an idea.”

  “Then you are mad, mon ami! Like many of your countrymen, you are quite mad!”

  Roger grinned. “That is a tradition I am not averse to living up to, as apparent madness often pays high dividends. And such a mental attitude is no monopoly of the English, as you seem to think. Many Frenchmen have it too, only here you term it l’Audace.”

  “Well, yes; and I admit that by audacity many great coups have been pulled off. But alone, in such an affair as this, it is not enough. Without the most careful planning in advance, what you propose is quite impossible.”

  “Last night, perhaps; tomorrow night, perhaps; but not tonight.”

  “What leads you to think that?”

  “Today’s events. A short while ago you were telling me how the mob prevented the Royal Family from going to St. Cloud the Easter before last. I remarked then that had they had the sense to make a second attempt that night after the mob had dispersed, they would have got away without difficulty. And you agreed with me.”

  “Ah! I see your li
ne of thought. But that was very different; St. Cloud is only on the far side of the Bois de Boulogne, so almost a suburb of Paris. The Sovereigns had been permitted to go there for a change of air in the previous summer, ten months after the mob had brought them as prisoners from Versailles. Again on this occasion the consent of the Assembly had been obtained; it was the mob alone that prevented their departure. Had they set out again that night the Municipal officers and National Guards in the Tuileries would not have attempted to stop them, whereas now they would certainly do so.”

  “You are still thinking of the situation at the Tuileries as it was yesterday, and will probably be again tomorrow,” Roger said earnestly. “But throughout tonight everything there is bound to remain in the utmost confusion, and it is that on which I count. The gates to the Cour Royale cannot be shut, nearly all the doors of the royal apartments have been broken down, and the bedrooms of the Queen and the Dauphin wrecked. The Royal Family will have to sleep in rooms which the guards are unaccustomed to watching, and will have been deprived of their usual means of communication. Therefore, on the excuse of wishing to see one another, they will be able to move about the Palace comparatively freely without exciting suspicion. I know a way by which we can communicate with them, and also one by which they can be secretly smuggled to the upper floors of the Palace. Could we but provide them with adequate disguises, I am convinced that on this one night they stand an excellent chance of making their escape.”

  “Mon Dieu! I believe you are right! But the risk is an appalling one. Should they be caught it may cost them their lives when the people get to hear of it.”

  “The risk is no greater than if they remain where they are. The plot to kill them failed today, but the Palace is to be attacked again tomorrow.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I was close to Santerre when the mob broke into the Palace and again when they left it. He believes me to be a good patriot from Alsace. It was he who told me that the attack is to be renewed, and you may be certain that his second attempt on the lives of the Sovereigns will be better organised.”

  “Then you had sounder reasons than I thought for wishing to take this desperate gamble tonight.”

  “I do not regard it as so very desperate,” Roger said quickly, “because even if they are caught all will not be lost. The frightful ordeal through which they passed today may now stand them in good stead. The National Guards and many of the Municipal officers are decent men; they were clearly horrified by the excesses of the mob, and would have prevented them if they could. Those very excesses give the King a reason for attempting to escape, which he did not possess before. Should he be caught he can plead that, since they were unable to protect him today, there is no reason to suppose that they will be able to do so tomorrow, and that by remaining in Paris he is now endangering the lives of himself and his family. He could say that he intended to go only to St. Cloud, and might even urge them to accompany him. To that they might well consent. If so, we should at least temporarily have got the Royal Family out of danger.”

  Barnave’s brown eyes lit up. “That is indeed a thought! In fact, it makes the venture very far from being the forlorn hope that I at first believed it. In what way do you require my help?”

  Roger’s blue eyes lit up in turn. Without Barnave his plan was doomed to almost certain failure; with him, and a little luck, Mr. Pitt’s wish that the Royal Family should reach Brittany might be fulfilled much more speedily than that gentleman had any grounds to expect. Leaning forward again, he said quickly:

  “First in the matter of disguises. As a family they are so damnably easy to recognise. We must split them up, of course; but, even so, all of them will have to come out through the Cour Royale. Can you suggest any means by which we could render them less easy of identification at a casual glance as they cross the court?”

  For a few moments Barnave sat pulling nervously at the lobe of his right ear, then he said: “The Tuileries still houses scores of pensioners who had been given apartments there before the Sovereigns were brought to Paris. A member of one such family might easily have fallen ill, and although priests and nuns are often jeered at by the mob in these days, they still go about their duties of attending on the sick. They always work in pairs, so the Queen and Madame Elizabeth would be very unlikely to arouse suspicion if they left the Palace dressed as two nursing sisters.”

  “Excellent! Nothing could be better, as their coifs would hide their faces; but where the devil can we lay our hands on such garments within the next hour or two?”

  “That is simple; in fact the robes gave me the idea. The Convent of the Feuillants was used as a depot for their Order and they were given little time to remove their possessions. Only yesterday I happened to notice that a small room off the hall of the Club is still half-filled with religious habiliments; I have only to take a portmanteau there and collect such garments as we require.”

  “Could you also find something suitable for the King?”

  “I will borrow a porter’s blouse from the concierge at my apartment. Wearing that, he could follow the two ladies as though he was their servant.”

  Roger nodded quickly. “That would serve the purpose well, and still better if you can find him something to carry. It should be a medium-sized box or small, round-lidded trunk, that he can carry on his shoulder. By transferring it from side to side as the situation demanded, he could conceal his face from anyone who was approaching him.”

  “For that he can use the portmanteau in which we furnish them with their disguises. But what of the two children?”

  “I have already devised a plan to cover them.” Roger glanced at his dirty hands with their broken nails, and added, “It needs only a little soot to give me the appearance of a chimney-sweep. The landlord at my inn is a trusty fellow, and will get me a few brushes without asking questions. All sweeps have their boys for going up big chimneys. The young Madame Royale must submit to having her face and arms blackened, her hair pushed under an old cap, and dressing herself in any dirty rags we can find for her; then I’ll take her out as my apprentice.”

  “The idea is a good one, except for the fact that a chimney-sweep would hardly be likely to be working at the Palace in the middle of the night.”

  “It is getting on for eleven o’clock already. We shall need at least a couple of hours to make our preparations, then the King and Queen have to be roused and persuaded to make the attempt. After that those who are to escape will require further time to disguise themselves, so I doubt if at the earliest we could get them away before three in the morning. That is not a good hour, as there will still be so few people about that they would run a maximum risk of being challenged. Moreover, in the dark it would be much more difficult for the various parties to find one another outside the Palace. I suggest that we should aim to leave at six o’clock. It will be light then and there will be enough people beginning to go about their ordinary business for the presence of nuns and chimney-sweeps not to arouse unwelcome comment.”

  Barnave smiled. “You reason extremely well for a madman. But how about the Dauphin? He is too young to play the rôle of a second assistant to you, and a child of that age is not often seen accompanying grown-ups in the street soon after dawn.”

  Roger’s blue eyes sparkled with amusement. “I know him to be a brave and intelligent child; he will do whatever his mother tells him. I mean to carry him out as if he was a hundredweight of soot—in a sack on my back.”

  “Bravo!” exclaimed Barnave. “I am really beginning to feel now that only ill-luck can rob us of success; providing, of course, that you can convince the King and Queen that their best hope of living through tomorrow lies in entrusting themselves to you.”

  Slowly Roger shook his head. “No, not to me. It is to you that they must be persuaded to entrust themselves.”

  “To me! But why? From what you have said I gather that you have known the Queen far longer than I have. This plan is yours and you tell me you have secret mean
s of communicating with her; therefore, it is obviously for you to get in touch with her and convince her of its soundness.”

  It was in this very matter that Barnave was essential to the carrying out of Roger’s plan, so he sighed, and making his voice deliberately emotional, said:

  “Alas, mon ami; time was when Marie Antoinette would, I think, have trusted me even in the most delicate affairs, but ’tis so no longer. On our way here you recalled my anti-war speech in the Jacobin Club, which of necessity was also strongly antimonarchical. You must, then, also remember how I succeeded in securing such a favourable hearing there—it was because I had incited the mob to murder the Spanish Envoy, Don Diego Sidonia y Ulloa. The Queen must know of both that and my speech, and so must believe that formerly she was entirely deceived about my character. If in these past two years she has ever thought of me at all, it must have been as a hypocrite who once curried favour with her but was all the time secretly a sans-culotte at heart. For me to approach her now would spell certain ruin to our intentions; but she still has faith in you, so will be favourably disposed to listen to your counsel.”

  “I see,” murmured Barnave; “then there seems no alternative but for me to make all arrangements with her. How do you propose that I should set about that?”

  “You must go to the Tuileries. Do you happen to know the Princesse de Lamballe’s apartment? It is immediately above that of the Queen.”

  It was Barnave’s turn to smile. “Yes, I know it well; and the staircase in the wall that connects the two. When I was secretly advising the Queen she often used it to come up and give me a private audience in Madame de Lamballe’s salon.”