Taking the Bastile (48 page)

‘One moment, my stout-hearted friend,’ cried Gilbert ‘No, I know not whither I am going. I have told you so, and I repeat it to you; however, I still go on, ana I will continue still to do so. My duty is traced out to me; my life belongs to God; but my works are the debt which I shall pay to my country. If I am mistaken, men wiU punish me but God will absolve me.’

‘But sometimes men punish those who are not mistaken. You said so yourself just now.’

‘And I say it again. It matters not, I persist. Billot : be it an error or not, I shall go orr. Before all, Billot, the Lord has said, ” Peace be to the man oi good intentions.” Therefore, be one of those to whom God has promised

3 iO TAKING THE BASTILLE

peace. Look at Monsieur do Lafayette, in America as well as France this is the third white charger he has worn out, without counting those he will wear out in future. Look at Monsieur de Bailly, who wears out his lungs. Look at the king, who wears out his popularity. Come, come, Billot let us not be egotistical. Let us also wear ourselves out a little. Remain with me, Billot.’

‘But to do what, if we do not prevent evil being done?’

‘Billot, remember never to repeat those words; for I should esteem you less. You have been trampled under foot, you have received hard fisticuffs, hard knocks from the butt-ends of muskets, and even from bayonets, when you wished to save Foulon and Berthier.’

‘Yes, and even a great many,’ replied the farmer, passing his hand over his still painful body.

‘And as to me said Pitou, ‘I had one eye almost put out.’

‘And all that for nothing,’ added Billot.

‘Well, my children, if instead of there being only ten, fifteen, twenty of your courage, there had been a hundred, two hundred, three hundred, you would have saved the unhappy man from the frightful death which was inflicted upon him; you would have spared the nation the blot which has sullied it. And that is the reason why, instead of returning to the country, I exact, as far as I can exact anything of you, my friend, that you should remain at Paris that I may have always near me a vigorous arm, an upright heart; that I might test my mind and my works on the faithful touchstone of your good sense and your pure patriotism; and, in fine, that we might strew around us, not gold for that we have not but our love of country and of the public welfare, in which you would be my agent with a multitude of misled, unfortunate men my staff, should my feet slip my staff, should I have occasion to strike a blow.’

‘A blind man’s dog,’ said Billot, with sublime simplicity.

‘Precisely,’ said Gilbert, in the same tone.

‘Well,’ said Billot, ‘I accept your proposal. I will be whatever you may please to make me.’

‘And I,’ said Pitou, ‘what am I to do?’

‘You?’ said Gilbert, looking at the ingenuous and hardy youth; ‘you, you will return to the farm, to console Billot’s family, and explain to them the holy mission he has undertaken.’

THE PITTS 317

‘Instantly 1’ cried Pitou, trembling with joy at the idea of returning to Catherine.

‘Billot,’ said Gilbert, ‘give him your instructions.’

‘They are as follows ,’ said Billot. ‘Catherine is appointed by me as mistress of the house. Do you understand?’

‘And Madame Billot?’ exclaimed Pitou, somewhat surprised at this slight offered to the mother, to the advancement of the daughter.

‘Pitou,’ said Gilbert, who had at once caught the idea of Billot, from seeing a slight blush suffuse the face of the honest farmer, ‘remember the Arabian proverb, ” to hear is to obey.” ‘

Pitou blushed in his turn. He had almost understood, and felt the indiscretion of which he had been guilty.

‘Catherine has all the judgment of the family,’ added Billot unaffectedly, in order to explain his idea.

Gilbert bowed in token of assent.

‘Is that all?’ inquired the youth.

‘All that I have to say,’ replied Billot.

‘But not as regards me,’ said Gilbert.

‘I am listening,’ observed Pitou.

‘You will go with a letter I shall give you to the College Louis le Grand,’ added Gilbert. ]You will deliver that letter to the Abbe Berardier; he will entrust Sebastian to you, and you will bring him here. After I have embraced him, you will take him to Villers-Cotterfits, where you will place him in the hands of the Abbe Fortier, that he may not altogether lose his time. On Sundays and Thursdays he will go out with you. Make him walk in the meadows and in the woods.

‘I have understood you perfectly,’ said Pitou. delighted to be thus restored to the friend of his childhood, and to the vague aspirations of a sentiment somewhat more adult, which had been awakened within him by the magic name of Catherine.

‘And now we, ‘said Gilbert to Billot, ‘we must set to worlc.’

318 TAKING THE BASTILLE

A DEGREE of calmness had succeeded at Versailles to the terrible moral and political agitations which we have placed before the eyes of our reader*. The king breathed again, and although ha could not help reflecting on the suffering his Bourbon pride had endured during his journey to Paris, he consoled himself with the idea of his reconquered popularity. During this time M. de Necker was organising, and by degrees losing his. Ai to the nobility, they were beginning to prepare their defection or their resistance. The people were watching and waiting.

During this time the queen, thrown back, as it were, on the resources of her own mind, assured that she was the object of many hatreds, shut herself up closely, almost concealed herself; for the also knew that, although the object of hatred to many, she was at the same time the object of many hopes.

Since the journey of the king to Paris ihe had scarcely taught a glimpse of Gilbert. Once, however, he had

B-esented himaeli to her in the vestibule which led to the ng’s apartments. And there, as he had bowed to her very humbly and respectfully, she was the first to begin a conversation’ with him.

‘Good-day, sir,’ said ‘she to him; ‘are you going to the king?’ And th*a she added, with a smile, in which there was a slight tinge of irony 9 ‘! it as counsellor, or as physician?’

‘It is as nil physician, madame,’ replied Gilbert. ‘I have t>day an appointed service.’

She made a sign to Gilbert to follow her. The doctor obeyed. They both of them went into a small sitting-room, which led to the king’s bedroom.

“Well, sir,’ said she, ‘you see that you were deceiving me, when you assured me the other day, with regard to the journey to Paris, that the king was incurring no danger.’

‘Who. I, madame?’ cried Gilbert, astonished.

‘Undoubtedly ! was not the kujg fixed at?’

‘Who baa said that, madame?’

WHAT THE QUEEN WISHED 319

‘Everybody, sir; and above all, those who saw the poor woman fall almost beneath the wheels of the king’s carriage. Who says that? Why, Monsieur de Beauvau and Monsieur d’Estaing, who saw your coat torn and your frill perforated by the ball.’

‘Madame 1’

“The ball which thus grazed you, sir, might have killed the king, as it killed that unfortunate woman; for, in short, it was neither you nor that poor woman that the murderers wished to kill.’

‘I do not believe in such a crime replied the doctor, hesitating.

‘Be it so; but I believe in it, rir,’ rejoined the queen, fixing her eyes on Gilbert.

‘At all events, if there was intentional crime, it ought not to be imputed to the people.’

‘Ah I’ she exclaimed, ‘to whom then, must it be attributed? Speak!’

‘Madame,’ continued Gilbert, shaking his head, ‘for some time past I have been watching and studying the people. Well, then, the people, when they assassinate in revolutionary times, the people kill with their hands; they are then like the furious tiger, the irritated lion.’

‘Witness Foulon and Berthier, yon would say. But was not Flesselles killed by a shot from a pistol; I was so told, at least; but after all,’ continued the queen, in a tone of irony, ‘perhaps it was not true; we crowned heads are so surrounded by flatterers.’

Gilbert, in his turn, looked intently at the queen.

‘Oh 1 as to him !’ said he, ‘you do not believe more than I do, madame, that it waa the people who killed him. There were people who were interested in bringing about his death.’

The queen reflected. ‘In fact,’ she replied, ‘that may be possible.’

‘Then,’ said Gilbert, bowing, as if to ask the queen if she had anything more to say to him.

‘I understand, sir,’ said the queen gently, stopping the doctor with an almost friendly gesture; ‘however that may be, let me tell you that you will never save the king’s life so effectually by your medical skill, as you did three days ago with your own breast.’

Gilbert bowed a second time. But as he saw that the queen remained, he remained also.

320 TAKING THE BASTILLE

‘I ought to have seen you again, sir,’ said the queen, after a momentary repose.

‘Your majesty had no further need of me,’ said Gilbert.

‘You are modest.’

‘I wish I were not so, madame.’

‘And why?’

‘Because, being less modest, I should be less timid, and consequently better able to serve my friends or to frustrate enemies.’

‘Why do you make that distinction? You say, my friends, but do not say my enemies.’

‘Because, madame, I have no enemies; or rather, because I will not, for my part at least, admit that I have any.’

The queen looked at him with surprise. >

‘I mean to say,’ continued Gilbert, ‘that those only are my enemies who hate me, but that I on my side hate no one.’

‘There is one passion, however, that still remains in your heart,’ said the queen, with a slight shade of artful irony.

‘And what passion is that, good Heaven?’

‘Your patriotism.’

Gilbert bowed.

‘Oh ! that is true,’ said he. ‘I adore my country, and for it I would make every sacrifice.’

‘Alasl’ said the queen, with undefinable melancholy, ‘there was a time when a good Frenchman would not have expressed that thought in the terms you now have used.’

‘What does the queen mean to say?’ respectfully inquired Gilbert.

‘I mean to say, sir, that in the times of which I speak, it was impossible for a Frenchman to love his country, without at the same time loving his queen and king.’

Gilbert blushed; he bowed, and felt within his heart one of those electric shocks, which, in her seducing intimacies, the queen produced on those who approached her.

‘You do not answer, sir,’ she said.

‘Madame,’ said Gilbert, ‘I beg you majesty to believe that all the king or queen might command ‘

‘You would do is it not so?’

‘Assuredly, madame.’

WHAT THE QUEEN WISHED 321

‘In doing which, sir,’ said the queen, resuming, in spite of herself, a slight degree of her accustomed haughtiness, ‘you would only be fulfilling a duty. God, who has given omnipotence to kings, has released them from the obligation of bemg grateful to those who merely fulfil a duty.

‘Alas 1 alas I madame,’ rejoined Gilbert, ‘the time is approaching when your servants will deserve more than your gratitude, if they will only fulfil their duty. In these days of disorder and demolition, you will in vain seek for friends where you have been accustomed to find servants. Pray to God, madame, to send you other servants, other supporters, other friends than those you have.’

‘Do you know any such?’

‘See now, madame; I who now speak to you, I was your enemy but yesterday.’

‘My enemy 1 and why were you so?’

‘Because you ordered that I should be imprisoned.’

‘And to-day?’

‘To-day, madame,’ replied Gilbert, bowing, ‘I am your servant.’

‘And your object?’

‘Madame ‘

‘The object for which you have become my servant. It is not in your nature, sir, to change your opinion, your belief, your affections, so suddenly. You are a man, Monsieur Gilbert, whose remembrances are deeply planted; you know how to perpetuate your vengeance. Come, now, tell me what was the motive of this change?’

‘Madame, you reproached me but now with loving my country too passionately.’

‘No one can ever love it too much, sir; the only question is to know how we love it. For myself, 1 love my country.’ (Gilbert smiled.) ‘Oh I no false interpretations, sir; my country is France. A German by blood, I am a Frenchwoman in my heart. I love France; but it is through the king. I love France from the respect due to God, who has given us the throne. And now to you, sir. I understand you, do I not? You love France, merely and simply for France herself.’

‘Madame,’ replied Gilbert, bowing, ‘I should fail hi respect to your majesty, should I fail in frankness.’

‘Oh !’ exclaimed the queen, ‘frightful, frightful period ! when all people who pretend to be people of worth, isolate T.B. L

322 TAKING THE BASTILLE

two thingi which have never been separated from each other: two principles which have always gone hand in haad France and her king. Well, I have still myself.’

And she angrily left the room, leaving Gilbert in amazement. She had just raised to his view, by the breath of her anger, one corner of the veil behind which she was combining the whole work of the counter-revolution.

‘Come, come,’ said Gilbert to himself, a* he went into the king’s room, ‘the queen is meditatinr some project.’

‘Really,’ said the queen to herself, as she was returning to her apartment, ‘decidedly, there is nothing to be made of this man, He has energy, but he has no devotedness.’

Gilbert returned to M. Necker after his professional visit to the king, whom he had found as tranquil as the queen was agitated. The king was composing speeches, he was examining accounts, he was meditating reforms in the laws. This well-intentioned man, whose look was so kind, whose soul was so upright, whose heart erred only from prejudices inherent to the royal condition, this man was absolutely bent on producing trivial reforms in exchange for the serious inroads made on his prerogative. This man inspired Gilbert with a feeling of profound pity. As to the queen, it was not thus, and in spite of his im-passibility, Gilbert felt that she wac one of those women whom it was necessary to love passionately, or to hato even to the death.