On being left together, the six masked men and the chairman whispered among themselves.
"Let all come in," said Cagliostro, for he was the Master; "I am ready to make the report I promised."
The door was instantly opened: the members of the league walked in; to crowd the hall once more.
Hardly was the door closed behind the last before the Master said holding up his hand quickly like one who knew the value of time, and wished not to lose a second:
"Brothers, there may be some here who were present at a meeting held just twenty years ago, a couple of miles from Danenfels, in a cavern of Thunder Mountain, five miles from the Rhine; if so, let the venerable upholders of the Great Cause which we have embraced, signify the same by holding up the hand, saying: 'I was there!'"
Five or six hands were held above the throng and as many voices cried: "I was there."
"So far good," continued the speaker; "the others are in the Temple above, or scattered over the earth, working at the common and holy work, for it is that of all mankind. Twenty years ago, this work which we have pursued in its different periods was scarce commenced. The light was at its dawning and the steadiest eyes beheld the future only through the cloud which none but the eyes of the chosen could pierce. At that meeting, I explained by what miracle death did not exist for me, it being merely for man forgetfulness of the past, or rather how, during twenty centuries, I had dwelt in succeeding bodies for my immortal soul. Slowly I saw peoples pass from slavery to serfdom, from serfdom to the state of those aspirations for freedom which precede it. Like the stars of the night hinting what a sun can be, we have seen the republics try their rules, at Genoa, Venice, Switzerland; but this is not what we needed.
"A great country was wanted to give the impetus, a wheel in which should be cogged all the others, a planet which should illumine the world."
A cheering murmur ran through the audience and Cagliostro proceeded with an inspired air:
"Heaven indicated to me, France. Indeed, having tried all systems, she appeared likely to suit our purpose, and we decided on her being first freed. But look back on France twenty years ago, and grant that it was great boldness or rather sublime faith to undertake such a task. In Louis XV.'s hands so weakly, it was still the realm of Louis XIV., an aristocratic kingdom, where the nobles had all the rights andthe rich all the privileges. At the head was a man who represented at once the lowest and the loftiest, the grandest and the paltriest, heaven and the masses. With a word he could make you wealthy or a beggar, happy or miserable, free or captive, keep you living or send you to death.
"He had three grandsons, young princes called to succeed him. Chance had it that he whom nature designated was also the choice of the people, if the people had any choice at the epoch. He was accounted kind, just, honest, learned, almost a lover of wisdom. In order to quench the wars which the fatal succession of Charles II. enkindled, the daughter of Maria Theresa was chosen for his wife: the two nations were to be indissolubly united which are the counterbalances west and east of Europe, France and Austria. So calculated Maria Theresa the foremost politician of Europe.
"It was at this period, none the less, when France, supported on Austria, Spain and Italy, was to enter on a new and desired reign that we determined—not that she should be the chief of kingdoms but that the French should be the first people free.
"It was demanded who would be the new Theseus to rush into the den of this Minotaur, thread the innumerable turnings of the maze while guided by the light of Truth, and face the royal monster. I replied it should be me. Some eager spirits, uneasy characters, wanted to know how long a time it would take to accomplish the first period of my enterprise, divided into three portions, and I required twenty years. They cried out against that. Can you understand this? man had been serf or slave for twenty centuries, and he mocked at me because I wanted twenty years to make him free!"
He looked upon the meeting, where his last words had provoked ironical smiles.
"In short, I obtained the twenty years. I gave my brothers the famous device: 'Lilia Pedibus Destrue—the Lilies shall be trodden underfoot!' and I set to work, urging all to do likewise. I entered France under arches of triumph; the rose and the laurel made the road from Strasburg to Paris one trellis garlanded with flowers. Everybody was shouting: 'Long live the Dauphiness! our future Queen!' Now, farfrom me to take credit to myself for the initiative or the merit of events; the Builder had planned all this and He laid each stone well and truly. He allowed this humble mason who officiates in this fane to see the Hand divinely wielding the Line and the Level and, praise unto Him! I have done some levelling: the rocks have been removed off the way, the bridge has been thrown over the flood, and the gulfs have been filled up so that the car has rolled smoothly. List brothers, to what has been performed in a score of years.
"Parliaments broken up: Louis XV., called once the Well-Beloved, dies amid general scorn! The Queen, after seven years, unfruitful wedlock, gives birth to children whose paternity is contested, so that she is defamed as mother of the Crown Prince, and dishonored as a woman in the case of the Diamond Necklace.
"The new King consecrated under the name of Louis the Desired, impotent in politics as in love, tries one utopia after another, until he reaches national bankruptcy, and has all kinds of ministers down to a Calonne. The Assembly of Worthies decrees the States General Congress, which appointed by universal suffrage, declares itself the National Assembly. The clergy and nobility are overcome by the other classes; the Bastile is stormed and the foreign troops driven out of the capital; the night of Aug. 4th, 1789, shows the aristocracy that they are reduced to nothing; on the 5th and 6th October, the King and Queen are shown that royalty is nothing; on the 14th of July,1790, the unity of France is shown to the world.
"The princes are deprived of popularity by their absconding; the King's brother loses his hold by the Favras conspiracy showing that he casts off his friends to save his neck. Lastly, the Constitution is sworn unto, on the Altar of the Country; the Speaker of the House of Representatives sits on a chair on the level with the King's; it is the Law and the Nation sitting side by side; attentive Europe leans towards us, silently watching—all who do not applaud are trembling. Now, is not France the cornerstone on which Free Europe shall be laid, the wheel which turns all the machine, the sun which shall illuminate the Old World?"
"Yea, yea, yea!" shouted all voices.
"But, brothers," continued the magician, "do you believe the work is so far advanced that we may leave it to get on by itself? Although the Constitution has been sworn to, can we trust to the royal vow?"
"Nay, nay, nay," cried every voice.
"Then we begin the second stage of the revolutionary work," pursued Cagliostro. "As your eyes see, I perceive with delight that the Federation of 1790 is not the goal but a halting-place: after the repose the court will recommence the task of counter-revolution: let us also gird up our loins and start afresh. No doubt for timid hearts there will be hours of weakening and of distrust; often the beam from the All-seeing Eye will seem to be eclipsed—the Hand that beckons us will cease to be seen. More than once during the second period, the cause will appear injured, even lost, by some unforeseen and fortuitous accident; all will seem to show that we are wrong; circumstances will look as if unfavorable; our enemies will have some triumph, our fellow-citizens will be ungrateful. After many real fatigues and apparent uselessness, many will ask themselves if they have not gone astray on the bad path.
"No, brothers, no; I tell you at this hour for the words to ring everlastingly in your ears, in victory as a blast of trumpets, in defeat as the rallying cry—No! leading races have their providential mission which must be unerringly accomplished. The Arch-Designer laid down the road and found it true and straight; His mysterious goal cannot be revealed until it is attained in its full splendor; the cloud may obscure it and we think it gone; an idea may recoil but, like the old-time knights, it is but to set the lance in rest and rush forward to hurl over the dragon.
"Brothers, brothers, our goal is the bonfire on the high mount, believed extinct because the ridge concealed it as we sank in the vale: then the weaklings muttered as they halted and whined: 'We have no beacon—we are blundering in the dark: let us stay where we are; what is the good of getting lost?' But the strong hearts keep right on confidently smiling, and soon will the light on theheightreappear, albeit it may disappear again, but each time it is brighter and clearer because it is more near!
"Thus will it be with the chosen band who, struggling, pressing on, persevering and above all believing in the Republic to be, arrive at the foot of the lighthouse of which the radiance will join that cast across the Atlantic by the Republic which we have also helped to throw off the tyrant's yoke. Let us swear, brothers, for ourselves and our descendants, since the eternal idea and principle serves many a generation, never to stop until we establish on this temple of the Architect the holy device of which we have conquered one portion: 'Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.'"
The speech was hailed with uproarious approbation.
"But do not confine it to France solely: inscribe it on the banner of mankind as the whole world's motto. And now, brothers, go out upon your task, which is great, so great that, through whatever vale of tears and of the shadow of death you must pass, your descendants will envy the holy errand you shall have accomplished, and like the crusaders who became more and more numerous and eager as their foregoers were slain, they march over the road whitened by the bones of their fathers. Be of good cheer, apostles; courage, pilgrims of freedom; courage, soldiers, Apostles, converts! pilgrims, march on! soldiers, fight!"
Cagliostro stopped, but that would have happened from the applause. Three times the cheering rose and was extinguished in the gloomy vaults like an earthquake's rumbling. Then the six masked men bowed to him one after another, kissed his hand and retired. Each of the brothers, bowing unto the platform where the new Peter the Hermit preached the renewal of the political crusade, passed out, repeating the motto:
"We shall Trample the Lilies under."
As the last went forth, the lamps were extinguished.
Alone remained the Arch-Revolutionist, buried in the bowels of the earth, lost in silence and darkness like those divinities of the Indies, into whose mysteries he asserted himself to have been initiated two thousand years before.
Some months after recorded events, about the end of March, 1791, Dr. Gilbert was hurriedly called to his friend Mirabeau, by the latter's faithful servant Deutsch, who had been alarmed.
Mirabeau had spoken in the House on the question of Mines, the interests of owners and of the State not being very clearly defined. To celebrate his victory, he gave a supper to some friends and was prostrated by internal pains.
Gilbert was too skillful a physician not to see how grave the invalid was. He bled him and the black blood relieved the sufferer.
"You are a downright great man," said he.
"And you a great blockhead to risk a life so precious to your friends for a few hours of fictitious pleasure," retorted his deliverer.
The orator smiled almost ironically, in melancholy.
"I think you exaggerate and that my friends and France do not hold me so dear."
"Upon my honor," replied Gilbert laughing, "great men complain of ingratitude and they are really the ungrateful ones. If it were a most serious malady of yours, all Paris would flock under your window; were you to die, all France would come to your obsequies."
"What you say is very consoling, let me tell you," said the other, merrily.
"It is just because you can see one without risking the other that I say it, and indeed, you need a great public demonstration to restore your morale. Let me take you to Paris within a couple of hours, my dear count; let me tell the first man on the street corner that you are ailing and you will see the excitement."
"I would go if you put off the departure till this evening, and let me meet you at my house in Paris at eleven."
Gilbert looked at his patient and the latter saw that he was seen through.
"My dear count, I noticed flowers on the Dining-room table," said he: "it was not merely a supper to friends."
"You know that I cannot do without flowers; they are my craze."
"But they were not alone."
"If they are a necessity I must suffer from the consequences they entail."
"Count, the consequences will kill you."
"Confess, doctor, that it will be a delightful kind of suicide."
"I will not leave you this day."
"Doctor, I have pledged my word and you would not make me fail in that."
"I shall see you this night, though?"
"Yes, really I feel better."
"You mean you drive me away?"
"The idea of such a thing."
"I shall be in town; I am on duty at the palace."
"Then you will see the Queen," said Mirabeau, becoming gloomy once more.
"Probably; have you any message for her?"
Mirabeau smiled bitterly.
"I should not take such a liberty, doctor; do not even say that you have seen me: for she will ask if I have saved the monarchy, as I promised, and you will be obliged to answer No! It is true," he added with a nervous laugh, "that the fault is as much hers as mine."
"You do not want me to tell her that your excess of exertions in the tribune is killing you."
"Nay, you may tell her that," he replied after brief meditation: "you may make me out as worse than I am, to test her feelings."
"I promise you that, and to repeat her own words."
"It is well: I thank you, doctor—adieu!"
"What are you prescribing?"
"Warm drinks, soothing, strict diet and—no nurse-woman less than fifty——"
"Rather than infringe the regulation I would take two of twenty-five!"
At the door Gilbert met Deutsch, who was in tears.
"All this through a woman—just because she looks like the Queen," said the man; "how stupid of a genius, as they say he is."
He let out Gilbert who stepped into his carriage, muttering:
"What does he mean by a woman like the Queen?"
He thought of asking Deutsch, but it was the count's secret, and he ordered his coachman to drive to town.
On the way he met Camille Desmoulins, the living newspaper of the day, to whom he told the truth of the illness because it was the truth.
When he announced the news to the King, the latter inquired if the count had lost his appetite.
"Yes, Sire," was the doctor's reply.
"Then it is a bad case," sighed the monarch, shifting the subject.
When the same words were repeated to the daughter of Maria Theresa, her forehead darkened.
"Why was he not so stricken on the day of his panegyric on the tricolor flag?" she sneered. "Never mind," she went on, as if repenting the expression of her hatred before a Frenchman, "it would be very unfortunate for France if this malady makes progress. Doctor, I rely on your keeping me informed about it."
At the appointed hour, Gilbert called on his patient at his town house. His eyes caught sight of a lady's scarf on a chair.
"Glad to see you," said Mirabeau, quickly as though to divert his attention from it, "I have learnt that you kept half your promise. Deutsch has been busy answering friendly inquiries from our arrival. Are you true to the second part? have you been to the palace and seen the King and Queen?"
"Yes; and told them you were unwell. The King sincerely condoled when he heard that you had lost your appetite. The Queen was sorry and bade me keep her informed."
"But I want the words she used."
"Well, she said that it was a pity you were not ill when you praised the new flag of the country."
He wished to judge of the Queen's influence over the orator.
He started on the easy chair as if receiving the discharge of a galvanic battery.
"Ingratitude of monarchs," he muttered. "That speech of mine blotted out remembrance of the rich Civil List and the dower I obtained for her. This Queen must be ignorant that I was compelled to regain the popularity I lost for her sake; but she no more remembers it than my proposing the adjournment of the annexation of Avignon to France in order to please the King's religious scruples. But these and other faults of mine I have dearly paid for," continued Mirabeau. "Not that these faults will ruin them, but there are times when ruin must come, whether faults help them forward or not. The Queen does not wish to be saved but to be revenged; hence she relishes no reasonable ideas.
"I have tried to save liberty and royalty at the same time; but I am not fighting against men, or tigers, but an element—it is submerging me like the sea: yesterday up to the knee, today up to the waist, to-morrow I shall be struggling with it up to my neck. I must be open with you, doctor; I felt chagrin first, then disgust. I dreamt of being the arbiter between the Revolution and monarchy. I believed I should have an ascendancy over the Queen as a man, and some day when she was going under the flood, I meant to leap in and rescue her. But, no! they would not honestly take me; they try to destroy my popularity, ruin me, annihilate me, and make me powerless to do either good or evil. So, now that I have done my best, I tell you, doctor, that the best thing I can do is die in the nick of time; fall artistically like the Dying Gladiator, and offer my throat to be cut with gracefulness; yield up the ghost with decency."
He sank back on the reclining chair and bit the pillow savagely. Gilbert knew what he sought, on what Mirabeau's life depended.
"What will you say if the King or the Queen should send to inquire after your health?" he asked.
"The Queen will not do it—she will not stoop so low."
"I do not believe, but I suppose, I presume——"
"I will wait till to-morrow night."
"And then?"
"If she sends a confidential man I will say you are right and I wrong. But if on the contrary none come, then it will be the other way."
"Keep tranquil till then. But this scarf?"
"I shall not see her, on my honor," he said, smiling.
"Good, try to get a good quiet night, and I will answer for you," said Gilbert, going out.
"Your master is better, my honest Deutsch," said he to the attendant at the door.
The old valet shook his head sadly.
"Do you doubt my word?"
"I doubt everything since his bad angel will be beside him."
He sighed as he left the doctor on the gloomy stairs. At the landing corner Gilbert saw a veiled shadow which seemed waiting: on perceiving him, it uttered a low scream and disappeared so quickly by a partly opened door that it resembled a flight.
"Who is that woman?" questioned the doctor.
"The one who looks like the Queen," responded Deutsch.
For the second time Gilbert was struck by the same idea on hearing this phrase: he took a couple of steps as though to chase the phantom, but he checked himself, saying,
"It cannot be."
He continued his way, leaving the old domestic in despair that this learned man could not conjure away the demon whom he believed the agent of the Inferno.
Next day all Paris called to inquire after the invalid orator. The crowd in the street would not believe Deutsch's encouraging report but forced all vehicles to turn into the side streets so that their idol should not be disturbed by their noise.
Mirabeau got up and went to the window to wave a greeting to theseworshipers, who shouted their wishes for his long life.
But he was thinking of the haughty woman who did not trouble her head about him, and his eyes wandered over the mob to see if any servants in the royal blue livery were nottrying to make their way through the mass. By evening his impatience changed into gloomy bitterness.
Still he waited for the almost promised token of interest, and still it did not come.
At eleven, Gilbert came; he had written his best wishes during the day: he came in smiling, but he was daunted by the expression on Mirabeau's face, faithful mirror of his soul's perturbations.
"Nobody has come," said he. "Will you tell me what you have done this day?"
"Why, the same as usual——"
"No, doctor and I saw what happened and will tell you the same as though present. You called on the Queen and told her how ill I was: she said she would send to ask the latest news, and you went away, happy and satisfied, relying on the royal word. She was left laughing, bitter and haughty, ignorant that a royal word must not be broken—mocking at your credulity."
"Truly, had you been there, you could not have seen and heard more clearly," said Gilbert.
"What numbskulls they are," exclaimed Mirabeau. "I told you they never did a thing at the right time. Men in the royal livery coming to my door would have wrung shouts of 'Long live the King!' from the multitude and given them popularity for a year."
He shook his head with grief.
"What is the matter, count?" asked Gilbert.
"Nothing."
"Have you had anything to eat?"
"Not since two o'clock."
"Then take a bath and have a meal."
"A capital idea!"
Mirabeau listened in the bath until he heard the street door close after the doctor.
Then he rang for his servant, not Deutsch but another, to have the table in his room decked with flowers, and "Madam Oliva" invited to sup with him.
He closed all the doors of the supper-room except that to the rooms of the strange woman whom the old German called his bad angel.
At about four in the morning, Deutsch who sat up, heard a violent ring of the room bell. He and another servant rushed to the supper-room, but all the doors were fastened so that they had to go round by the strange lady's rooms. There they found her in the arms of their master, who had tried to prevent her giving the alarm. She had rung the table-bell from inability to get at thebell pull.
She was screaming as much for her own relief as her lover's, as he was suffocating her in his convulsive embrace.
It seemed to be Death trying to drag her into the grave.
Jean ran to rouse Dr. Gilbert while Deutsch got his master to a couch. In ten minutes the doctor drove up.
"What is it now?" he asked of Deutsch, in the hall.
"That woman again and the cursed flowers! Come and see."
At this moment something like a sob was heard; Gilbert, ran up the stairs at the top step of which a door opened, and a woman in a white wrapper ran out suddenly and fell at the doctor's feet.
"Oh, Gilbert," she screamed, "save him!"
"Nicole Legay," cried the doctor; "was it you, wretch, who have killed him?" A dreadful thought overwhelmed him. "I saw her bully Beausire selling broadsides against Mirabeau, and she became his mistress. He is undoubtedly lost, for Cagliostro set himself against him."
He turned back into his patient's room, fully aware that no time was to be lost. Indeed, he was too versed in secrets of his craft still to hope, far less to preserve any doubt. In the body before his eyes, it was impossible to see the living Mirabeau. From that time, his face assumed the solemn cast of great men dying.
Meanwhile the news had spread that there was a relapse and that the doom impended. Then could it be judged what a gigantic place one man may fill among his fellows. The entire city was stirred as on great calamities. The door was besieged by persons of all opinions as though everybody knew they had something to lose by his loss.
He caused the window to be opened that he might be soothed by the hum of the multitude beneath.
"Oh, good people," he murmured: "slandered, despisedand insulted like me, it is right that those Royals should forget me and thePlebesbear me in mind."
Night drew near.
"My dear doctor," he said to him who would not leave him, "this is my dying day. At this point nothing is to be done but embalm my corpse and strew flowers roundabout."
Scarcely had Jean, to whom everybody rushed at the door for news, said he wanted flowers for his master, than all the windows opened, and flowers were offered from conservatories and gardens of the rarest sorts. By nine in the morning the room was transformed into a bower of bloom.
"My dear doctor, I beg a quarter of an hour to say good-bye to a person who ought to quit the house before I go. I ask you to protect her in case they hoot her."
"I leave you alone," said Gilbert, understanding.
"Before going, kindly hand me the little casket in the secretary."
Gilbert did as requested; the money-box was heavy enough to be full of gold.
At the end of half an hour, spent by Gilbert in giving news to the inquirers, Jean ushered a veiled lady out to a hackney-carriage at the door.
Gilbert ran to his patient.
"Put the casket back," said he in a faint voice. "Odd, is it not?" he continued, seeing how astonished the doctor looked at its being as heavy as before, "but where thedeucewill disinterestedness next have a nest?"
Near the bed, Gilbert picked up a lace handkerchief wet with tears.
"Ah, she would take nothing away—but she left something," remarked Mirabeau.
Feeling it was damp he pressed it to his forehead.
"Tears? is she the only one who has a heart?" he murmured.
He fell back on the bed, with closed eyes; he might have been believed dead or swooning but for the death-rattle in his breast.
How came it that this man of athletic, herculean build should die?
Was it not because he had held out his hand to stay the tumbling throne from toppling over? Was it not because he had offered his arm to that woman of misfortune known as Marie Antoinette?
Had not Cagliostro predicted some such fate to Gilbert for Mirabeau? and the two strange creatures—one, Beausire, blasting the reputation, the other, Nicole, blasting the health of the great orator who had become the supporter of the monarchy—were they not for him, Gilbert, a proof that all things which were obstacles to this man—or rather the idea he stood for—must go down before him as the Bastile had done?
Nevertheless he was going to try upon him the elixir of life which he owed to Cagliostro; it was irony to save his victim with his own remedy.
The patient had opened his eyes.
"Nay," said he, "a few drops will be vain. You must give me the whole phial. I had the stuff analyzed and found it was Indian hemp; I had some compounded for myself and I have been taking it copiously not to live but to dream."
"Unhappy man that I am," sighed Gilbert; "he has led to my dealing out poison to my friend."
"A sweet poison, by which I have lengthened out the last moments of my life a hundredfold. In my dream I have enjoyed what has really escaped me, riches, power, and love. I do not know whether I ought to thank God for my life, but I thank you, doctor, for your drug. Fill up the glass and let me have it."
Gilbert presented the extract which the patient absorbed with gusto.
"Ah, doctor," he said after a short pause, as if the veil of the future were raised at the approach of eternity; "blessed are those who die in this year, 1791! for they will have seen the sunny side of the Revolution. Never has a great one cost so little bloodshed up to now, because it is the mind that was conquered: but on themorrowthe war will be upon facts and in things. Perhaps you believe that the tenants of the Tuileries will mourn for me? not at all. My death rids them of an engagement. With me, they had to rule in a certain way:I was less support than hindrance.Sheexcused herself for leaning on me, to her brother: 'Mirabeau believes that he is advising me—I am only amusing myself with him.' That is why I wished that woman, her likeness, to be my mistress, and not my Queen.
"What a fine part he shall play in History who undertook to sustain the young nation with one hand and the old monarchy in the other, forcing them to tread the same goal—the happiness of the governed and the respect of the governors. It might have been possible and might be but a dream; but I am convinced that I alone could have realized the dream. My sorrow is not in dying, but in dying with work unfinished. Who will glorify my idea left mangled, an abortion? What will be known of me will be the part that should be buried inoblivion—my wild, reckless, rakish life and my obscene writings.
"I shall be blamed for having made a bond with the court out of which comes gain for no man; I shall be judged, dying at forty-two, like one who lived man's full age. They will take me to task as if instead of trying to walk on the waters in a storm, I had trodden a broad way paved with laws, statutes, and regulations. To whom shall I league my memory to be cleansed and be an honor to my country?
"But I could do nothing without her, and she would not take my helping hand. I pledged myself like a fool, while she remained unfettered. Butit is so—all is for the best; and if you will promise one thing, no regret will trouble my last breath."
"Good God, what would I not promise?"
"If my passing from life is tedious, make it easy? I ask the aid not only of the doctor but of the man and the philosopher—promise to aid me. I do not wish to die dead,—but living, and the last step will not be hard to take."
The doctor bent his head towards the speaker.
"I promised not to leave you, my friend; if heaven hath condemned you—though I hope we have not come to that point—leave to my affection at the supreme instant the care of accomplishing what I ought to do. If death comes, I shall be at hand also."
"Thanks," said the dying one as if this were all he awaited.
The abundant dose of cannabis indicus had restored speech to the doomed one: but thisvitalityof the mind vanished and for three hours the cold hand remained in the doctor's without a throb. Suddenly he felt a start: the awakening had come.
"It will be a dreadful struggle," he thought.
Such was the agony in which the strong frame wrestled that Gilbert forgot that he had promised to second death, not to oppose it. But, reminded of his pledge, he seized the pen to write a prescription for an opiate. Scarcely had he written the last words than Mirabeau rose on the pillow and asked for the pen. With his hand clenched by death he scrawled:
"Flee, flee, flee!"
He tried to sign but could only trace four letters of his name.
"For her," he gasped, holding out his convulsed arm towards his companion.
He fell back without breath, movement or look—he was dead.
Gilbert turned to the spectators of this scene and said:
"Mirabeau is no more."
Taking the paper whose destination he alone might divine, he rapidly departed from the death chamber.
Some seconds after the doctor's going, a great clamor arose in the street and was prolonged throughout Paris.
The grief was intense and wide. The Assembly voted a public funeral, and the Pantheon, formerly Church of St. Genevieve, was selected for the great man's resting-place. Three years subsequently the Convention sent the coffin to the Clamart Cemetery to be bundled among the corpses of the publicly executed.
Petion claimed to have discovered a contra-revolutionary plot written in the hand of Mirabeau, and Congress reversed its previous judgment and declared that genius could not condone corruption.
On the morning of the second of April, an hour before Mirabeau yielded up his last breath, a superior officer of the navy, wearing his full dress uniform of captain, entered the Tuileries Palace like one to whom the ways were familiar.
He took the private stairs to the King's apartments, where, by the study, a valet saw him and uttered a cry of surprise.
"Hue," he said, laying a finger on his lips, "can the King receive me?"
"His Majesty gave word that you were to be shown inwhenever you arrived."
He opened a door and as a proof that the King was alone, he called out:
"The Count of Charny!"
"Let him enter," said the King; "I have been expecting him since yesterday."
Charny entered quickly and said as he went up to his royal master with respectful eagerness:
"Sire, I am a few hours behindhand, but I hope to be forgiven when your Majesty hears the reasons for the delay."
"Come, come, my lord; I awaited you with impatience, it is true; but I was of your opinion beforehand that an important cause alone could delay your journey. You have come, and you are welcome."
He held out his hand which the courier kissed with reverence.
"Sire, I received your order early the day before yesterday and I started at three A. M. yesterday from Montmedy by the post."
"That explains the few hours delay," observed the sovereign, smiling.
"Sire," went on the count, "I might have dashed on and made better speed but I wanted to study the road as it is generally used so as to remark the posting-houses where the work is well or ill done; I wished to jot the time down by the minute. I have noted everything and am consequently in a position to answer on any point."
"Bravo, my lord," cried the King. "You are a first-rate servitor; but let me begin by showing how we stand here; you can give me the news of the position out there afterwards."
"Things are going badly, if I may guess by what I have heard," observed Charny.
"To such a degree that I am a prisoner in the place, my dear count. I was just saying to General Lafayette that I would rather be King at Metz than over France; but never mind, you have returned. You know my aunts have taken to flight? it is very plain why. You know the Assembly will allow no priests to officiate at the altar unless they take oaths to the country. The poor souls became frightened as Easter came near, thinking they risked damnation by confessing to a priest who had sworn to the Constitution, and I must confess, it was on my advice that they went to Rome. No law opposes their journey and no one can think two poor women will much strengthen the party of the fugitive nobility. They charged Narbonne with getting them off; but I do not know how the movement was guessed. A visit of the same nature as we experienced at Versailles in October was projected upon them, but they happily got out by one door while the mob rushed in by another. Just think of the crosses! not a vehicle was at hand though three had been ordered to be ready. They had to go to Meudon from Bellevue on foot.
"They found carriages there and made the start. Three hours afterwards, tremendous uproar in Paris: those who went to stop the flight found the nest warm but empty. Next day the press fairly howled: Marat said that they were carrying away millions; Desmoulins that they were taking the Dauphin. Nothing of the sort: the two poor ladies had a few hundred thousand francs in their purses, and had enough to take care of without burdening themselves with a boy who might bring about their recognition. The proof was that they were recognized,without him, first at a place where they were let go through, and then at Arnay, where they were arrested. I had to write to the Assembly to get them passed, and spite of my letter the Assembly debated all day. However, they were authorized to continue their journey but on condition that the committee of the House should present a bill against quitting the kingdom."
"Yes," said Charny, "but I understood, that, in spite of a magnificent speech from Mirabeau, the Assembly rejected the proposition."
"True, it was thrown out: but beside this slight triumph was great humiliation for me. When the excitement was noticed over the departure of the two ladies, a few devoted friends, more than you may believe being left to me, count—some hundreds of noblemen hastened to the Tuileries and offered me their lives. The report was immediately spread that a conspiracy was discovered to spirit me away. Lafayette, who had been gulled into going to the Bastile under a story that an attempt to rebuild it was under way, came back here furious at the hoax, and entered with sword and bayonet!—my poor friends were seized and disarmed. Pistols were found on some,stilettoson others, each having snatched up at home any weapon handy. But the day is written down in history as that of the Knights of the Dagger!"
"Oh, Sire, in what dreadful times do we live," said Charny, shaking his head.
"Yes, and Mirabeau perhaps dying, maybe dead at present speaking."
"The more reason to hasten out of thiscauldron."
"Just what we havedecidedon. Have you arranged with Bouille? I hope he is strong enough now. The opportunity was presented and I reinforced him."
"Yes, Sire: but the War Minister has crossed your orders; the Saxon Hussars have drawn from him, and the Swiss regiments refused. He had trouble to keep the Bouillon Foot at Montmedy Fort."
"Does he doubt now?"
"No Sire, but there are so many chances less. What matters? in these dashes one must reckon on luck, and westill have ninety per cent of chances. The question is if your Majesty holds to the Chalons Route although the posting at Varennes is doubtful?"
"Bouille already knows my reasons for the preference."
"That is why I have minutely mapped out the route."
"The route-chart is a marvel of clearness, my dear count. I know the road as though I had myself travelled it."
"I have the following directions to add——"
"Let me look at them by the map." And he unfolded on the table a map drawn by hand with every natural feature laid in. It was a work of eight months. The two stooped over the paper.
"Sire, the real danger begins at St. Menehould and ceases at Stenay. On those eighteen leagues must be stationed the soldiers."
"Could they not be brought nearer Paris—say, up to Chalons?"
"It is difficult," was the response. "Chalons is too strong a place for even a hundred men to do anything efficacious to your safety if menaced. Besides, Bouille does not answer for anything beyond St. Menehould. All he can do is set his first troops at Sommevelle Bridge. That is the first post beyond Chalons."
"What time will it take?"
"The King can go from Paris to Montmedy in thirty-six hours."
"What have you decided about the relay of horses at Varennes? where we must be certain not to want for them; it is most important."
"I have investigated the spot and decided to place the horses on the other side of the little town. It will be better to dash through, coming full speed from Clermont, and change horses five hundred paces from the bridge, guarded and defended if signalled by three or four men."
Charny gave the King a paper.
It was Bouille's arrangement of the stations of the troops along the road for the royal escape. The cover would be that the soldiers were waiting to convoy some money sent by the War Minister.
"Everything has been foreseen," said the King delightedly. "But talking of money, do you know whether Bouille has received the million I sent him?"
"Yes, but as assignats are below par, he would lose twenty per cent on the gross amount, only for a faithful subject of your Majesty who cashed, as if gold, a hundred thousand crowns' worth."
"And the rest?" inquired the King, eyeing the speaker.
"Count Bouille got his banker to take it; so that there will be no lack of the sinews of war."
"I thank you, my lord count," said the sovereign. "I should like to know the name of the faithful servitor who perhaps lessened his cash by giving the sum to Bouille."
"He is rich and consequently there was no merit in what he did. The only condition he put in doing the act was to have his name kept back."
"Still you know him?"
"Yes, I know who it is."
"Then, Lord Charny," said the monarch with the hearty dignity which he sometimes showed, as he took a ring off his finger, "here is a jewel very dear to me. I took it off the finger of my dying father when his hand was chill in death. Its value is therefore that which I attach to it; it has no other; but for a soul which understands me, it will be more precious than the finest diamond. Repeat to the faithful servitor what I say, my lord, and give him this gem from me."
Charny's bosom heaved as he dropped on one knee to receive the ring from the royal hand.
At this juncture the door opened. The King turned sharply, for a door to open thus was worse than infraction ofetiquette; it was an insult only to be excused by great necessity.
It was the Queen, pale and holding a paper. She let it drop with a cry of astonishment at seeing Count Charny at the feet of her consort. The noble rose and saluted the lady, who faltered:
"Charny here, in the King's rooms, in the Tuileries!" And she said to herself: "Without my knowing it!"
There was such sorrow in the tone that Charny guessed the reason and took two steps towards her.
"I have just arrived and I was going to crave the King's permission for me to pay my respects to your Majesty," he said.
The blood reappeared on her cheeks; she had not heard that voice for a long while and the sweet tone charmed her ears. She held out both hands towards him but brought back one upon her heart from its beating too violently. Charny noticed all this although in the short space required for the King to pick up the paper, which the draft from the door had floated to the side of the room.
The King read without understanding.
"What is the meaning of the word 'Flee' three times written, and the fragment of a signature?" inquired he.
"Sire, it seems that Mirabeau died ten minutes ago, and that is the advice he sends you."
"It is good advice," returned the King, "and this time the instant to put it into execution has come."
The Queen looked at them both, and said to the count:
"Follow me, my lord."
The Queen sank upon a divan when she had arrived within her own apartments, making a sign for Charny to close the door.
Scarcely was she seated before her heart overflowed and she burst into sobs. They were so sincere and forcible that they went down into the depths of Charny's heart and sought for his former love. Such passions burning in a man never completely die out unless from one of those dreadful shocks which turn love to loathing.
He was in that strange dilemma which they will appreciate who have stood in the same: between old love and the new.
He loved his wife with all the pity in his bosom and he pitied the Queen with all his soul. He could not help feeling regret and giving words of consolation.
But he saw that reproach pierced through this sobbing; that recrimination came to light among the tears, reminding him of the exactions of this love, the absolute will, the regal despotism mingled with the expressions of tenderness and proofs of passion; he steeled himself against the exactions and took up arms against the despotism, entering into the strife against the will. He compared all this with Andrea's sweet, unalterable countenance, and preferred the statue, though he believed it to be of snow, to this glowing bronze, heated from the furnace, ever ready to dart from its eyes the lightnings of love, pride and jealousy.
This time the Queen wept without saying anything.
It was more than eight months since she had seen him. Before this, for two or three years she had believed that they could not separate without their hearts breaking. Her only consolation had been that he was working for her sake in doing some deed for the King.
But it was a weak consolation.
She wept for the sake of relief, for her pent-up tears would have choked her if she had not poured them forth. Was it joy or pain that held her silent? both, perhaps, for many mighty emotions dissolve in tears.
With more love even than respect, Charny went up to her, took one of her hands away from her face and said as he applied his lips to it:
"Madam, I am proud and happy to say that not an hour has been without toil for you since I went hence."
"Oh, Charny," retorted the Queen, "there was a time when you might have been less busy on my account but you would have thought the more of me."
"I was charged by the King with grave responsibility, which imposed the more strict silence until the business was accomplished. It is done at present. I can see and speak with you now, but I might not write a letter up to this period."
"It is a fine sample of loyalty, and I regret that it should be performed at the expense of another sentiment, George," she said with melancholy.
She pressed his hand tenderly, while eyeing him with thatgaze for which once he would have flung away the life still at her service.
She noticed that he was not the courier dusty and bloody from spurring, but the courtierspicand span according to the rules of the Royal Household. This complete attire visibly fretted the woman while it must have satisfied the exacting Queen.
"Where do you come from?" she asked.
"Montmedy, in postchaise."
"Half across the kingdom, and you are spruce, brushed and dandified like one of Lafayette's aid-de-camps. Were the news you brought so unimportant as to let you dally at the toilet table?"
"Very important; but I feared that if I stepped out of the mud be-splattered postchaise in the palace yard, all disordered with travel, suspicion would be roused; the King had told me that you are closely guarded, and that made me congratulate myself on walking in, clad in my naval uniform like an officer coming to present his devoirs after a week or two on leave."
She squeezed his hand convulsively, having a question to put the harder to frame as it appeared so far from important.
"I forgot that you had a Paris house. Of course you dropped in at Coq-Heron Street, where the countess is keeping house?"
Charny was ready to spring away like a high-mettled steed spurred in the raw; but there was so much hesitation and pain in her words that he had to pity one so haughty for suffering so much and for showing her feelings though she was so strong-minded.
"Madam," he replied, with profound sadness not wholly caused by her pain, "I thought I had stated before my departure that the Countess of Charny's residence is not mine. I stopped at my brother Isidore's to change my dress."
The Queen uttered a cry of joy and slid down on her knees, carrying his hand to her lips, but he caught her up in both arms and exclaimed:
"Oh, what are you doing?"
"I thank you—ask me not for what! do you ask me for what? for the only moment of thorough delight I have felt since your departure. God knows this is folly, and foolish jealousy, but it is most worthy of pity. You were jealous once, though you forget it. Oh, you men are happy when you are jealous, because you can fight with your rivals and kill or be slain; but we women can only weep, though we perceive that our tears are useless if not dangerous. For our tears part us from our beloved rather than wash us nearer; our grief is the vertigo of love—it hurls us towards the abyss which we see without avail. I thank you again, George; you see that I am happy anew and weep no more."
She tried to laugh; but in her repining she had forgotten how to be merry, and the tone was so sad and doleful that the count shuddered.
"Be blessed, O God!" she said, "for he would not have the power to love me from the day when he pities me."
Charny felt he was dragged down a steep where in time he would be in the impossibility of checking himself. He made an effort to stop, like those skaters who lean back on their heels at the risk of breaking through the ice.
"Will you not permit me to offer the fruit of my long absence by explaining what I have been happy to do for your sake?" he said.
"Oh, Charny, I like better to have things as I said just now; but you are right: the woman must not too long forget she is a Queen. Speak, ambassador, the woman has obtained all she had a right to claim—the Queenlistens."
The count related how he had surveyed the way for the flight of the Royal Family, and how all was ready. She listened with deep attention and fervent gratitude. It seemed to her that mere devotion could not go so far; that it must be ardent and unquiet love to foresee such obstacles and invent the means to cope with and overcome them.
"So you are quite happy to save me?" she asked at the end, regarding him with supreme affection.
"Oh, can you ask me that? it is the dream of my ambition, and it will be the glory of my life if I attain it."
"I would rather it were simply the reward of your love,"replied Marie Antoinette with melancholy. "But let that pass! you ardently desire this great deed of the rescue of the Royal Family to be performed by you?"
"I await but your consent to set aside my life to it."
"I understand it, my dear one," said the sovereign: "your dedication ought to be free from all alien sentiment, and material affection. It is impossible that my husband and our children should be saved by a hand which would not dare to be stretched out towards them if they slipped on the road we are to travel in company. I place their lives and mine in your custody, as to a brother: but you will feel some pity for me?"
"Pity?"
"You cannot wish that in one of those crises when one needs all courage, patience and coolness, a mad idea of mine—for in the night one may see thespecterswhich would not frighten in the day—you cannot wish that all should fail because I had not your promise that you loved me?"
"Lady," interrupted Charny, "above all I aim at your Majesty's bliss: that of France; the glory of achieving the task I have begun; and I confess that I am sorry the sacrifice I make is so slight; but I swear not to see the Countess of Charny without your Majesty's permission."
Coldly and respectfully saluting the monarch's consort, he retired without her trying to detain him, so chilled was she by his tone.
Hardly had he shut the door after him, than she wrung her hands and ruefully moaned:
"Oh, rather that he made the vow not to see me, but loved me as he loves her!"
Spite of all precautions, or perhaps because they necessitated changes in the usual order of things, suspicion was engendered in Paris by the plot at the palace.
Lafayette went straight to the King, who mocked at hishalf-accusations: Bailly sent a denunciatory letter to the Queen, having become quite courteous, not to say a courtier.
About nine in the night of the 20th of June, two persons were conversing in the sitting-room of the Countess of Charny, in Coq-Heron Street.
She was apparently calm but was deeply moved, as she spoke with Isidore, who wore a courier's dress. It was composed of a buff leather riding jacket, tight breeches of buckskin and top-boots, and he carried a hunting-sword. His round laced hat was held in his hand.
"But in short, viscount, since your brother has been two months and a half in town, why has he not come here?" she persisted.
"He has sent me very often for news of your health."
"I know that, and I am grateful to both of you; but it seems to me that he ought to come to say good-bye if he is going on another journey."
"Of course, my lady, but it is impossible; so he has charged me to do that."
"Is the journey to be a long one?"
"I am ignorant."
"I said 'yours' because it looks from your equipment that you are going too."
"I shall probably leave town this midnight."
"Do you accompany your brother or go by another route?"
"I believe we take the same."
"Will you tell him you have seen me?"
"Yes, my lady: for he would not forgive me omitting to perform the errand of asking after you, judging by the solicitude he put in charging me, and the reiterated instructions he gave me."
She ran her hands over her eyes, sighed, and said after short meditation:
"Viscount, as a nobleman, you will comprehend the reach of the question I am putting; answer as you would were I really your sister; as you would to heaven. In the journey he undertakes, does my Lord Charny run any serious danger?"
"Who can tell where no danger is or is not in these times?" evasively responded young Charny. "On the morning of theday when my brother Valence was struck down, he would have surely answered No, if he had been asked if he stood in peril. Yet he was laid low in death by the morrow. At present, danger leaps up from the ground, and we face death without knowing whence it came and without calling it."
Andrea turned pale and said,
"There is danger of death, then? You think so if you do not say it."
"I think, lady, that if you have something important to tell my brother, the enterprise we are committed to is serious enough to make you charge me by word of mouth or writing with your wish or thought to be transmitted to him."
"It is well: viscount, I ask five minutes," said the countess, rising.
With the mechanical, slow step habitual to her, she went into her room, of which she shut the door.
The young gentleman looked at his watch with uneasiness.
"A quarter past nine, and the King expects me at half after," he muttered: "luckily it is but a step to the palace."
But the countess did not take the time she had stated; in a few seconds she returned with a sealed letter, and said with solemnity,
"Viscount, I entrust this to your honor."
Isidore stretched out his hand to take it.
"Stay, and clearly understand what I am telling you," said Andrea: "if your brother count fulfills the undertaking, there is nothing to be said to him beyond what I stated—sympathy for his loyalty, respect for his devotion and admiration for his character. If he be wounded"—here her voice faltered—"badly hurt, you will ask the favor for me to join him, whereupon you will send a messenger who can conduct me straight to him for I shall start directly. If he be mortally injured—" here emotion checked her voice: "Hand him this note; if he cannot read it, read it to him, for I want him to know this before he dies. Your pledge as a nobleman to do this, my lord?"
"On my honor," replied Isidore, as much affected as the speaker.
He kissed her hand and went out.
"Oh, if he should die, I must have him know that I love him!"
At the same time as he quitted his sister-in-law's and thrust the letter in his breast, beside another of which he had read the address by the light of a street lamp, two men, dressed just like himself, were ushered into the Queen's boudoir, but by different ways.
These two did not know each other but judging that the same business thus arrayed them they bowed to one another.
Immediately another door still opened and in walked Viscount Charny, the third outrider, who was as unknown to the other two, Malden and Valory, Royal Lifeguardsmen, as they, it happened, to each other. Isidore alone knew the aim of their being brought together, and the common design. No doubt he would have replied to the inquiries they were going to put but the door opened and Louis XVI. appeared.
"Gentlemen," said he to Malden and Valory, "excuse me disposing of you without your permission but you belonged to my guards and I hold you to be faithful servitors of the crown; so I suggested your going to a certain tailor's and trying one courier's costume which you would find there and be at the palace at half-past nine this evening. Your presence proves that you accept the errand with which I have to charge you."
The two guardsmen bowed.
"Sire," said Valory, "your Majesty was fully aware that he had no need to consult his gentlemen about laying down their lives on his behalf."
"Sire, my brother-soldier answers for me in answering for himself, and I presume for our third companion," said Malden.
"Your third companion, gentlemen, is an acquaintance good to form, being Viscount Charny, whose brother was slain defending the Queen's door at Versailles; we are habituated to the devotion of members of his family, so that we do not thank them for it."
"According to this," went on Valory, "my Lord of Charny would know the motive of our gathering, while we are ignorant and eager to learn."
"Gentlemen," said the King, "you know that I am a prisonerto the National Guard, the Assembly, the Mayor of Paris, the mob, to anybody who is for the time being the master. I rely on you to help me shake off this humiliation, and recover my liberty. My fate, that of the Queen and of our children, rests in your hands: all is ready for me to make away to-night; will you undertake to get me out of this place?"
"Give the orders, my lord," said the three young men.
"You will understand that we cannot go forth together. We are to meet at the corner of St. Nicaise Street, where Count Charny awaits us with a hired carriage. You, viscount, will take care of the Queen, and use the name of Melchior; you, Malden, under the name of Jean, escort Lady Elizabeth and the Princess Royal; you, Valory, guard Lady Tourzel and the Dauphin; they will call you François. Do not forget your new names and await further instructions."
He gave his hand all round to them and went out, leaving three men ready to die for him.
He went to dress, while the Queen and the others were also attiring themselves plainly, with large hats to conceal their faces.
Louis put on a plain grey suit with short breeches, grey stockings and buckled shoes. For the week past his valet Hue had gone in and out in a similar dress so as to get the sentinels used to the sight. He went out by the private door of Lord Villequier, who had fled the country six months before.
In provision of this flight, a room of his quarters had been set aside on the eleventh of the month. Here were the Queen and the others assembled. This flat was believed uninhabited; the King had the keys: and the sentries at about eleven were accustomed to see a number of the servants, who did not sleep on thepremises, quit the palace in a flock.
Isidore Charny, who had been over the road with his brother, would ride on ahead; he would get the postboys ready so that no delay would be incurred.
Malden and Valory, on the driver's box, were to pay the postillions, who were given extra money as the carriage for the journey was a specially built one and very heavy fromhaving to carry so many persons. Count Charny was to ride inside, ready for all emergencies; he would be well armed, like the three outriders; a pair of pistols for each were to be in the vehicle.
At a fair pace they reckoned to be at Chalons in thirteen hours.
All promised to obey the instructions settled between Charny and the Count ofChoiseul.
Lights were blown out and all groped their way at midnight into Villequier's rooms. But the door by which they ought to have passed straightway, was locked. The King had to go to his smithy for keys and apick-lock.
When he opened the door, he looked round triumphantly in the light of a little night-lamp.
"I will not say that a locksmith's art is not good sometimes," said the Queen; "but it is also well to be the King at others."
They had to regulate the order of the sallying forth.
Lady Elizabeth led, with the Princess Royal. At twenty paces she was followed by Lady Tourzel and the Dauphin. Malden came on behind to run to their succor.