Madame Tussaud: A Novel of the French Revolution

by Michelle Moran

  “That the monastery of Saint-Lazare was ransacked,” Jacques says.

  Armand reaches for a sausage. “And all of the monks have been turned out. They can live off the fat of their bellies now.”

  “That is a sin,” my mother says.

  Armand sees he has offended her and puts down his sausage. “Perhaps it is. But we are starving, Madame. It is all well and good for the National Assembly to proclaim this law and that. But where is the food? Can they force the king to give us food?”

  “He doesn’t have enough food to feed a nation,” I reply.

  “Then we shall find a government that knows how to conduct trade for grain. The members of the National Assembly are meeting at the Hôtel de Ville,” he says. “If you hear cannon shots tomorrow, it might be battle, or it might be the National Assembly summoning its deputies to a meeting. They are looking to create their own militia. It will be every patriot’s duty to provide this new militia with whatever weapons they have.”

  “Including the shops that have been broken into?” Henri asks.

  “Yes,” Armand says earnestly.

  “Isn’t that thievery?” Jacques wants to know.

  “Not if it’s for the greater good. We found a barge at the Port Saint-Nicholas carrying forty casks of powder. That powder would have gone to the king’s army if we hadn’t taken it. Where is it better used?” Armand asks. “By tomorrow, the king will be facing a formidable army,” he promises. “A citizens’ militia.”

  Chapter 25

  JULY 13, 1789

  When the government violates the people’s rights, insurrection is … the most indispensable of duties.

  —MARQUIS DE LAFAYETTE

  ONLY CURTIUS AND I ARE AWAKE WHEN THE CANNON FIRE begins. Perhaps it has gone on all night and only now can it be heard on the Boulevard du Temple. But the sound seems to shake our house on its foundations. We look across the table at each other, and my uncle puts down his coffee.

  “Battle, or a meeting of the National Assembly?” I ask fearfully.

  “It will be the meeting in the Hôtel de Ville. Can’t you hear the tocsin?”

  If I strain, I can just make out the ringing of the bells above the cannons. “What if the king’s troops defeat them? What if they throw Lafayette and Robespierre into prison?”

  “That’s why we straddle both worlds until it’s clear which side will be the victor. In three days, you’ll go back to Versailles. Meanwhile, whatever good patriots are doing, we’ll do. They want green cockades? We’ll wear them. They need arms for the citizens’ militia? We’ll donate. And as soon as it’s safe to reopen the Salon, the exhibits will change weekly. Daily even, if that’s what events call for.” He stands from his chair and begins to pace. “We’ll want to change our signs from “Monsieur” and “Madame” to “Citizen” and “Citizeness.” That’s what all the papers are using. We don’t want to be behind.”

  “Then we should change the Room of Notables to the Room of Great Patriots as well.”

  “Yes. And whatever happens—” Curtius stops pacing to look at me. Even at six in the morning, he is wearing a waistcoat and an embroidered vest, just in case the king or the Duc should come calling. “The Salon de Cire must continue. This will be your inheritance, Marie, and you will make it your children’s inheritance someday.”

  “Why are you saying this?”

  “The Glorious Revolution in England swept away many good families. We don’t know how we’ll be caught up in this. Already, we’ve provided models for Camille’s procession.”

  “The mob could have stolen those busts,” I say quickly. “Or they could have forced us to hand them over. Why should the king believe we were part of it?”

  “He might not. But men have been sent away for much less. Did you hear that the commander of the Swiss Guards, the Baron de Besenval, has been placed in charge of the king’s troops?”

  “Abrielle’s father?”

  “Yes.” My uncle sighs. “Of all the women to fall in love with … Wolfgang might have chosen anyone.” He smiles at me. “At least you have some sense.”

  I look down at my coffee. Clearly, Henri has taken Curtius aside and made his intentions known. “You know I cannot marry now.”

  “Henri told me. But Marie, you will never be left homeless or poor. That much I swear.”

  There is the sound of a horse and carriage outside, and both of us pause. I go to the window and recognize the man with the auburn hair and mahogany walking stick. “I can’t believe it.”

  Curtius rises. “Who is it?”

  “The Marquis de Lafayette!”

  “Go and wake your mother. And make some more coffee.”

  I rush to my mother’s chamber. The curtains are drawn against the summer’s light, casting the silk-paneled walls in shadow. From the embroidered settee to the cushioned armchair, everything has been done in robin’s-egg blue. I push the airy bed hangings aside and see that my mother is still asleep. I should let her be, but I know she would be angry to miss Lafayette. I gently shake her shoulder. I’m surprised she doesn’t hear the cannons.

  “What? What’s happening?”

  “The Marquis de Lafayette has come,” I say.

  She struggles to a sitting position. “Why?”

  “I don’t know. Perhaps he wants to borrow a bust. Or maybe he’s come about the citizens’ militia.”

  My mother is on her feet and at her vanity at once, twisting her dark curls into a loose bun and dabbing her petite wrists with perfume. I hand her a gown, and while she ties her fichu, I fetch a lace bonnet from the wooden commode. “The one with the good trim,” she says. “Not that one. The blue.” She brushes her teeth and dabs eau de lavande onto her breasts.

  “Curtius says to bring coffee,” I tell her.

  “Yes. And we’ll want sausages. Isn’t that what the marquis liked the last time he was here?”

  I can’t remember these things like my mother. She can recall what she served at every salon, and which foods each of our guests preferred. “I’m not sure,” I admit.

  “I’m certain it was sausage. But we’ll bring out the ham, just in case.”

  When we enter the salon, the marquis and my uncle are deep in conversation. Neither looks pleased. “Ah.” Curtius stands. “Coffee and sausages.”

  Lafayette rises, and his dress is impeccable. His green culottes match his long-tailed coat. It’s interesting that he has chosen not to wear a wig. It will be a great deal of work for me if false hair goes out of fashion, since real hair has to be set into the wax heads strand by strand. The marquis kisses my hand. “Citizeness Grosholtz.”

  “Is that really how we are to greet each other?” I ask, confirming what Curtius said this morning.

  “Yes. From now on I am Citizen Lafayette.”

  I hide my shock and step aside so that he can greet my mother. How can there be a world with no titles? What will men be? All equals? My mother and I take seats, and Curtius explains, “Lafayette has come with news.”

  “A National Guard has been formed,” Lafayette says, “and I have had the honor of being named its Commander in Chief. We’ve enlisted eight hundred men to patrol every district in France, and they’re to pay for their own weapons and uniforms. This way, we know they are committed to duty. But now we’re searching for good men to act as captains of each district.”

  My mother gasps. “And you want Curtius?”

  Lafayette nods. “That is my hope.”

  I look to my uncle, who trained as a doctor, not a soldier.

  “It is a great honor,” he says hesitantly.

  “One I am not offering to just anyone,” Lafayette adds. “A country is only as strong as its military, and only as moral as the men who serve in its ranks.”

  Curtius takes his pipe from the table. He fills it with tobacco, then offers the wooden box to the marquis, who passes. He lights the bowl, and the three of us wait while Curtius thinks. “You understand I’m not a military man,” he says at last. “I would be
useless on the field.”

  Lafayette is undisturbed. “This will not be a battle like any soldier has ever known. This will be fought in the city, on the streets, and in the palaces. Good sense, not experience, is what matters now.”

  “And it doesn’t disturb you that I am old?”

  “General George Washington was forty-six when the Revolution in America began. I don’t think his age held him back.” He leans forward. His eyes are fixed on my uncle, and I know that whatever he is about to say, it will be something complimentary. “We are in the midst of our own revolution. Make no mistake, the events of these next few days will be recorded in history, and the men making those events will be remembered as heroes. Do your patriotic duty. There will be pay, but also rewards that go far beyond money. This nation needs men of upstanding character. It needs a captain like you.”

  Curtius is going to say yes. I know because his eyes are wide with the promise of it all. He puts down his pipe. “How many men would I command?”

  “Forty. And they’ll all be wearing the blue, white, and red.”

  “I thought it was green.”

  “That is the color of the king’s brother, the Comte d’Artois. I’ve proposed a tricolor.”

  “Like America?”

  “Exactly. So shall I send a man to fit you for your uniform?”

  The sound of cannon fire has stopped, replaced with the voices of a growing mob. There is no knowing who is in charge anymore. The king? His soldiers? The National Assembly?

  “Yes. I will do it,” my uncle replies.

  Chapter 26

  JULY 14, 1789

  THE CREATION OF THIS NEW NATIONAL GUARD HAS ENCOURAGED the butchers to open their shops and the milliners to begin accepting customers again. If we are lucky, the Salon may reopen tomorrow. We’ve lost six hundred sous over the past two days.

  I smile at the tailor who arrived this morning with baskets of fabric. Lafayette sent him to turn my uncle into a captain, and while he’s here, he’s to make a costume for our new figure of Lafayette. We’ll be the first of anyone—painters, sculptors, even engravers—to display Lafayette as Commander in Chief of the National Guard.

  I study the tailor. His shoes have silver buckles, and his waistcoat is embroidered. The man is ambitious. “Don’t let him overcharge us,” I say in German. “We’ll pay thirty livres for Lafayette’s uniform. Nothing more.”

  “I can manage the finances,” Curtius replies. “Go with Henri. Take Yachin home while the city’s still quiet.”

  Outside, in the late morning light, it’s as if nothing has changed. The vendors have returned to the streets, and the Boulevard smells of coffee and flowers. Yachin is on the steps, and Henri is showing him how to read a barometer. The people passing seem calm. “Shall we?” he asks as soon as he sees me.

  As we begin to walk, I notice that Henri is carrying his pistol. When we reach the Jewish quartier, the streets become narrower and the buildings less imposing. There are broken windows and boarded-up homes. A man steps from the doorway of a printing shop in a National Guard uniform and blocks our path. “What is your business here, Citizen?”

  The three of us stop, and Henri steps forward. “We are taking this boy home.”

  The guardsman looks down his nose at Yachin. His face is dark, meaning he’s spent much of his life in the sun. He might be thirty or forty. It’s impossible to tell. “What’s your name?” he demands.

  “Homberg,” Yachin replies. “Citizen Homberg.”

  “Tell me, Citizen Homberg. Are you a good patriot?”

  “Yes. My family—they are printers. They all—we all—believe in liberty.”

  “Then how come you see fit to wear your Jew cap but not your colors?” The guardsman’s eyes shift to Henri, then to myself. None of us are wearing the tricolor cockade.

  “We have just come from the Boulevard du Temple,” I say quickly. “The shops have been shut and there’s nowhere to purchase—”

  “Do you think I bought this?” The guardsman points to his red and blue ribbon. “A true patriot finds a way.”

  “Her uncle has been made captain of his district,” Henri says. “He’s being fitted now for his uniform. We are friends of Citizen Lafayette.”

  The guardsman looks me over, and I wonder if he has the power to stop us. “I suggest,” he says strongly, “that when you return this boy to his parents, you find yourselves some cockades. Patriots wish to recognize other patriots in the streets.”

  “Thank you,” says Henri. “We will take your advice.”

  We walk quickly, in case the guardsman should think of something else. I whisper, “Could he have made problems for us?”

  “He could have tried,” Henri says.

  We stop in front of a white building with broken green shutters.

  “Would you like to come inside?” Yachin hesitates. “My mother would be happy—”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Henri says gently. He’s been so kind to Yachin. Someday, he will make a wonderful father. “Go upstairs, and tell your parents about the cockades.”

  “And return only when your family says it’s safe,” I add. “That could be a day, a week, even a month. They will know.”

  As soon as he is gone, Henri takes my arm. What would it be like to walk these streets without him? “The guardsman is right,” he says as we hurry back to the Boulevard du Temple. “We should be wearing the tricolor.”

  “In support of Revolution? On Thursday, I have to return to Versailles—”

  “As a tutor?” Henri stops walking. “Marie, the king has lost half of his army. A king without an army is a king in name only. What good will it do the Salon for you to be known as a royal tutor?”

  “We … we don’t know what the future holds for the National Assembly. The queen might call on her brother in Austria for help, and all of this will turn to dust.” I continue walking, and Henri follows. “Remaining with the royal family is prudent,” I say. “They still love the king in the provinces. Robespierre wrote to Curtius last week; his letter arrived after Lafayette visited. It’s his greatest concern.”

  “That the king is popular?”

  “That the peasants won’t understand the cause for liberty. It could all go either way,” I tell him.

  “Agreed. And until we know which way it’s going, we should wear the cockade.”

  When we reach the Boulevard, there are half a dozen carriages outside the Salon, and none of them belong to men we know. The horses have been decorated with tricolor sashes. Even the coachmen are wearing multiple cockades. “Guardsmen?” I ask.

  “Or members of the National Assembly.”

  I open the door to the Salon, and two dozen men turn around to stare. Only one has a familiar face, and he’s the only one not dressed in a blue coat with white lapels and leggings.

  “Marie! Henri!” Camille moves through the crowd. I search the room for Lucile, but she’s not here. “Where have you been?” he exclaims. “You almost missed everything. They s-s-stormed the Invalides this morning. Eighty thousand of them!”

  “Eighty thousand?” Henri is sure he’s heard wrong, but Camille is nodding in triumph. Does he understand what this kind of anarchy means? Without a king, the only ones left to govern us are men who wish to take the king’s place. What happens if the National Guard should fail?

  “They’ve captured thirty thousand muskets,” Camille is saying. “And more than a dozen cannons. Now they need gunpowder, and we know where that is kept.”

  “The Bastille,” Henri guesses.

  “There’s no point in going to Versailles anymore. The Revolution is happening here!”

  My uncle emerges from the crowd of men, and now—like them—he is dressed as a member of the National Guard. “Some of the crowd are making their way to the Bastille. The National Guard has to be there.” He looks to Henri. “Will you stay with Marie?”

  “Of course,” Henri replies, taking my hand.

  “And Maman?” I ask.


  “Upstairs,” Curtius says. He turns and faces the two dozen guardsmen. It’s like watching an actor onstage. It isn’t real. It can’t be real. If I touch his face, it will be wax and all of this just a moving tableau. But as the men file past, I smell the powder on their skin and the leather of their shoes and know that it’s happening.

  Curtius stops at the door to embrace me. “Tell your mother I’ll be back for tonight’s salon,” he says in German.

  Camille has moved to join the men, armed with a quill and a notebook. Henri and I watch them disappear down the Boulevard du Temple, and when he closes the door, I am speechless.

  WHEN CAMILLE RETURNS, he is trying to catch his breath. No one shows up on our doorstep without panting anymore. “The B-B-Bastille,” he gasps, and I usher him inside. “The Bastille—”

  “What about the Bastille?” Henri snaps irritably. It is three in the afternoon, and we’ve been waiting all day for word. My mother’s food has gone cold, and the three of us have been sitting downstairs by the window, watching every passerby.

  “They’ve stormed the Bastille!” Camille cries.

  I hurry to shut the door, and Maman fetches Camille a chair and a drink. He makes a great show of taking both, keeping us in suspense. Then he tells us how a mob of a thousand men approached the gates, demanding that the Marquis de Launay surrender the fortress’s thirty thousand pounds of gunpowder. But de Launay refused, saying he would have to write to Versailles and wait for instructions from the king. As the crowd grew, a carriage-maker climbed to the top of perfume shop next to the gates and cut the chains to the massive drawbridge.

  “And as the bridge came thundering down, the crowd rushed into the inner courtyard. They thought the guards were letting them inside, and the guards thought the mobs were storming the fortress. So the king’s soldiers opened fire!”