ON leaving the queen's apartment, the king immediately found himself surrounded by all the officers and all the persons of his household, who had been appointed by him to attend him on his journey to Paris.
The principal personages were Messieurs de Beauvau, de Villeroy, de Nesle, and d'Estaing.
Gilbert was waiting in the middle of the crowd till Louis XVI. should perceive him, were it only to cast a look upon him in passing.
It could be easily perceived that the whole of the throng there present were still in doubt, and that they could not credit that the king would persist in following up the resolution he had come to.
“After breakfast, gentlemen,” said the king, “we will set out.”
“Ah, you are there, Doctor,” he continued, “you know that I take you with me.”
The king went into his cabinet, where he was engaged two hours. He afterwards attended Mass with all his household; then, at about nine o'clock, he sat down to breakfast.
The repast was taken with the usual ceremonies, excepting that the queen, who, after attending Mass, was observed to be out of spirits, her eyes red and swollen, had insisted on being present at the king's repast, but without partaking of it in the slightest manner, that she might be with him to the last moment.
The queen had brought her two children with her, who, already much agitated, doubtless by what the queen had said to them, were looking anxiously from time to time at their father's face, and then at the crowd of officers of the guards, who were present.
The children, moreover, from time to time, by order of their mother, wiped away a tear, which every now and then would rise to their eyelids; and the sight of this excited the pity of some and the anger of others, and filled the whole assembly with profound grief.
The king ate on stoically. He spoke several times to Gilbert, without taking his eyes off his plate; he spoke frequently to the queen, and always with deep affection.
At last he gave instructions to the commanders of his troops.
He was just finishing his breakfast, when an officer came in to announce to him that a compact body of men on foot, coming from Paris, had just appeared at the end of the grand avenue leading to the Place d'Armes.
On hearing this, the officers and guards at once rushed out of the room. The king raised his head and looked at Gilbert; but seeing that Gilbert smiled, he tranquilly continued eating.
The queen turned pale, and leaned towards Monsieur de Beauvau, to request him to obtain information.
Monsieur de Beauvau ran out precipitately.
The queen then drew near to the window.
Five minutes afterwards Monsieur de Beauvau returned.
“Sire,” said he, on entering the room, “they are National Guards, from Paris, who, hearing the rumor spread yesterday in the capital, of your Majesty's intention to visit the Parisians, assembled to the number of some ten thousand, for the purpose of coming out to meet you on the road; and not meeting you so soon as they expected, they have pushed on to Versailles.”
“What appear to be their intentions?” asked the king.
“The best in the world,” replied Monsieur de Beauvau.
“That matters not,” said the queen; “have the gates closed.”
“Take good care not to do that,” said the king; “it is quite enough that the palace-doors remain closed.”
The queen frowned, and darted a look at Gilbert.
The latter was awaiting this look from the queen, for one half his prediction was already fulfilled. He had promised the arrival of twenty thousand men, and ten thousand had already come.
The king turned to Monsieur de Beauvau.
“See that refreshments be given to these worthy people,” said he.
Monsieur de Beauvau went down a second time. He transmitted to the cellar-men the order he had received from the king.
After doing this, he went upstairs again.
“Well?” said the king, in a tone of inquiry.
“Well, Sire, your Parisians are in high discussion with the gentlemen of the Guards.”
“How!” cried the king, “there is a discussion?”
“Oh! one of pure courteousness. As they have been informed that the king is to set out in two hours, they wish to await his departure, and march behind his Majesty's carriage.”
“But,” inquired the queen, in her turn, “they are on foot, I suppose?”
“But the king has horses to his carriage, and the king travels fast, very fast; you know, Monsieur de Beauvau, that the king is accustomed to travelling very rapidly.”
These words, pronounced in the tone the queen pronounced them, implied:—
“Put wings to his Majesty's carriage.”
The king made a sign with his hand to stop the colloquy.
The queen heaved a sigh which almost resembled a cry of anger.
“It would not be right,” tranquilly added Louis XVI., “that I should make these worthy people run, who have taken the trouble to come so far to do me honor. My carriage shall be driven at a walk, and a slow walk too, so that everybody may be able to follow me.”
The whole of the company testified their admiration by a murmur of approbation; but at the same time there was seen on the countenances of several persons the reflection of the disapproval which was expressed by the features of the queen, at so much goodness of soul, which she considered as mere weakness.
The queen turned round, amazed. It was Gilbert, who, in his quality of physician, had only exercised the right which appertained to him of renewing the air of the dining-room, thickened by the odors of the viands and the breathing of two hundred persons.
The doctor stood behind the curtains of the open window, through which ascended the voices of the crowd assembled in the courtyard.
“What is that?” asked the king.
“Sire,” replied Gilbert, “the National Guards are down there on the pavement, exposed to the heat of the sun, and they must feel it very oppressive.”
“Why not invite them upstairs to breakfast with the king?” sarcastically said one of her favorite officers to the queen.
“They should be taken to some shady place; put them into the marble courtyard, into the vestibules, wherever it is cool,” said the king.
“Ten thousand men in the vestibules!” exclaimed the queen.
“If they are scattered everywhere, there will be room enough for them,” said the king.
“Scattered everywhere!” cried Marie Antoinette, why, sir, you will teach them the way to your own bedchamber.”
This was the prophecy of terror which was to be realized at Versailles before three months had elapsed.
“They have a great many children with them, Madame,” said Gilbert, in a gentle tone.
“Children!” exclaimed the queen.
“Yes, Madame; a great many have brought their children with them, as if on a party of pleasure. The children are dressed as little National Guards, so great is the enthusiasm for this new institution.”
The queen opened her lips as if about to speak; but almost instantly she held down her head.
She had felt a desire to utter a kind word; but pride and hatred had stopped it ere it escaped her lips.
Gilbert looked at her attentively.
“Ah!” cried the king, “those poor children! When people bring children with them, it is plain that they have no intention to do harm to the father of a family,—another reason for putting them in a cooler place, poor little things! Let them in; let them in.”
Gilbert then, gently shaking his head, appeared to say to the queen, who had remained silent:—
“There, Madame; that is what you ought to have said; I gave you the opportunity. Your kind words would have been repeated, and you would have gained two years of popularity.”
The queen comprehended Gilbert's mute language, and a blush suffused her face.
She felt the error she had committed, and immediately excused herself by a feeling of pride and resistance, which she expressed by a glance, as a reply to Gilbert. During this time Monsieur de Beauvau was following the king's orders relating to the National Guards.
Then were heard shouts of joy and benediction from that armed crowd, admitted by the king's order to the interior of the palace.
The acclamations, the fervent wishes, the loud hurrahs, ascended as a whirlwind to the hall in which the king and queen were seated, whom they reassured with regard to the disposition of the so-much-dreaded inhabitants of Paris.
“Sire,” said Monsieur de Beauvau, “in what order is it that your Majesty determines the procession shall be conducted?”
“And the discussion between the National Guards and my officers?”
“Oh, Sire, it has evaporated, vanished; those worthy people are so happy that they now say, 'We will go wherever you may please to place us. The king is our king as much as he is everybody else's king. Wherever he may be, he is ours.”
The King looked at Marie Antoinette, who curled, with an ironical smile, her disdainful lip.
“Tell the National Guards,” said Louis XVI., “that they may place themselves where they will.”
“Your Majesty,” said the queen, “will not forget that your body-guards have the right of surrounding your carriage.”
The officers, who perceived that the king was somewhat undecided, advanced to support the arguments of the queen.
“That is the case, undoubtedly,” replied the king. “Well, we shall see.”
Monsieur de Beauvau and Monsieur de Villeroy left the room to take their stations and to give the necessary orders.,
The clock of Versailles struck ten. “Well, well,” said the king, “I shall put off my usual labors till to-morrow; these worthy people ought not to be kept waiting.”
Marie Antoinette went to the king, clasped him in her arms, and embraced him. The children clung weeping to their father's neck. Louis XVI., who was much moved, endeavored gently to release himself from them; he wished to conceal the emotions which would soon have become overpowering.
The queen stopped all the officers as they passed her, seizing one by his arm, another by his sword.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen!” said she. And this eloquent exclamation recommended to them to be watchful for the safety of the king, who had just descended the staircase.
All of them placed their hands upon their hearts and upon their swords.
The queen smiled to thank them.
Gilbert remained in the room till almost the last.
“Sir,” said the queen to him, “it was you who advised the king to take this step. It was you who induced the king to come to this resolution, in spite of my entreaties. Reflect, sir, that you have assumed a fearful responsibility as regards the wife, as regards the children.”
“I am sensible of that,” coldly replied Gilbert.
“And you will bring the king back to me safe and unhurt?” she said with a solemn gesture.
“Reflect that you will answer for his safety with your head.”
“Reflect that your head is answerable,” cried Marie Antoinette, with the menacing and pitiless authority of an absolute monarch.
“Upon my head be the risk,” said the doctor, again bowing. “Yes, Madame; and this pledge I should consider as a hostage of but little value, if I believed the king's safety to be at all threatened. But I have said, Madame, that it is to a triumph that I this day conduct his Majesty.”
“I must have news of him every hour,” added the queen.
“You shall, Madame; and this I swear to you.”
“Go, sir; go at once. I hear the drums; the king is about to leave the palace.”
Gilbert bowed, and descending the grand staircase, found himself face to face with one of the king's aides-de-camp, who was seeking him by order of his Majesty.
They made him get into a carriage which belonged to Monsieur de Beauvau; the grand master of the ceremonies not allowing, as he had not produced proofs of his nobility, that he should travel in one of the king's carriages.
Gilbert smiled on finding himself alone in a carriage with arms upon its panels, Monsieur de Beauvau being on horseback, curvetting by the side of the royal carriage.
Then it struck him that it was ridiculous in him thus to be occupying a carriage on which was painted a princely coronet and armorial bearings.
This scruple was still annoying him when, from the midst of a crowd of National Guards, who were following the carriage, he heard the following conversation, though carried on in a half-whisper by men who were curiously stretching out their necks to look at him.
“Oh! that one,—that is the Prince de Beauvau.”
“Why,” cried a comrade, “you are mistaken.”
“I tell you it must be so, since the carriage has the prince's arms upon it.”
“The arms! the arms! I say that means nothing.”
“Zounds!” said another, “what do the arms prove?”
“They prove that if the arms of Monsieur de Beauvau are upon the coach, it must be Monsieur de Beauvau who is inside of it.”
“Monsieur de Beauveau,—is he a patriot?” asked a woman.
“Pooh!” exclaimed the National Guard. Gilbert again smiled.
“But I tell you,” said the first contradictor, “that it is not the prince. The prince is stout; that one is thin. The prince wears the uniform of a commandant of the guards; that one wears a black coat,—it is his intendant.”
A murmur, which was by no means favorable to Gilbert, arose among the crowd, who had degraded him by giving him this title, which was not at all flattering.
“Why, no, by the devil's horns!” cried a loud voice, the sound of which made Gilbert start. It was the voice of a man who with his elbows and his fists was clearing his way to get near the carriage. “No,” said he, “it is neither Monsieur de Beauvau nor his intendant. It is that brave and famous patriot, and even the most famous of all the patriots. Why, Monsieur Gilbert, what the devil are you doing in the carriage of a prince?”
“Ha! it is you, Father Billot!” exclaimed the doctor.
“By Heaven,” replied the farmer, “I took good care not to lose the opportunity!”
“Oh, he is not far off. Hilloa, Pitou! where are you? Come this way; come quickly!”
And Pitou, on hearing this invitation, managed by a dexterous use of his shoulders to slip through the crowd till he reached Billot's side, and then with admiration bowed to Gilbert.
“Good-day, Monsieur Gilbert,” said he.
“Good-day, Pitou; good-day, my friend.”
“Gilbert! Gilbert who is he?” inquired the crowd of one another.
“Such is fame,” thought the doctor,—“well known at Villers-Cotterets; yes; but at Paris popularity is everything.”
He alighted from the carriage, which continued its onward progress at a walk, while Gilbert moved on with the crowd, on foot, leaning on Billot's arm.
He in a few words related to the farmer his visit to Versailles, the good disposition of the king and the royal family; he in a few minutes preached such a propaganda of royalism to the group by which he was surrounded that, simple and delighted, these worthy people, who were yet easily induced to receive good impressions, uttered loud and continued shouts of “Long live the king!” which, taken up by those who preceded them, soon reached the head of the line, and deafened Louis XVI. in his carriage.
“I will see the king!” cried Billot, electrified. “I must get close to him, and see him well; I came all this way on purpose. I will judge him by his face; the eye of an honest man can always speak for itself. Let us get nearer to his carriage, Monsieur Gilbert, shall we not?”
“Wait a little, and it will be easy for us to do so,” replied Gilbert; “for I see one of Monsieur de Beauvau's aides-de-camp, who is seeking for some one, coming this way.”
And, in fact, a cavalier, who, managing his horse with every sort of precaution, amid the groups of fatigued but joyous pedestrians, was endeavoring to get near the carriage which Gilbert had just left.
“Are you not looking, sir, for Doctor Gilbert” he inquired.
“Himself,” replied the aide-de-camp.
“Monsieur de Beauvau sends for you, at the king's request.”
These high-sounding words made Billot's eyes open widely; and on the crowd they had the effect of making them open their ranks to allow Gilbert to pass. Gilbert glided through them, followed by Billot and Pitou, the aide-de-camp going before them, who kept on repeating:
“Make room, gentlemen, make room; let us pass, in the king's name, let us pass!”
Gilbert soon reached the door of the royal carriage, which was moving onward as if drawn by Merovingian oxen.
