THE ASSASSINATION.
Early on the next day a strange and exciting report pervaded the city
of Rastadt. Austrian regiments were encamped all round the city, and
Sczekler hussars held all the gates. This was the report which filled
with astonishment and terror all those who were not initiated into the
secrets of the political situation, and who were not familiar with
the condition of the negotiations between France and Germany. For, by
surrounding the city with troops, in spite of the presence of the French
ambassadors, Austria openly violated the treaty stipulating that, until
the congress had adjourned sine die, neither German nor French troops
should approach the city within a circuit of three German miles.
It was reported, too--what the ambassadors as yet remaining in Rastadt
had carefully concealed up to this time--that the imperial ambassador,
Count Metternich, had quietly left the city several days before,
and that the peace commissioners of the empire had the day previous
suspended their official functions.
Congress had then dissolved; the peace commissioners of France and
Germany had been in session for two years without accomplishing their
task, and the situation looked as ominous and warlike as ever.
Every one resolved to depart; every trunk was being packed, every
carriage drawn forth from its shed. The French actors and ballet-dancers
had fled from Rastadt several weeks before at the first rude blast of
the approaching storm, like rats leaving a sinking ship. The sounds of
joy and mirth had died away, and everywhere only grave and gloomy words
were heard, only sorrowful and downcast faces met.
Every one, as we stated above, was preparing to set out, and the French
ambassadors, too, were going to leave Rastadt to-day, the twenty-eighth
of April. Their carriages were ready for them early in the morning in
the courtyard of the castle, when, all at once, some footmen of the
embassy, with pale, frightened faces, rushed into the castle and
reported that Austrian hussars were posted at the gates and refused to
allow any one to leave or enter the city. Even the commander of Rastadt,
an officer of the Duke of Baden, had not been permitted by the hussars
to ride out of the gate. He had been compelled to return to his
headquarters. [Footnote: Historical.--Vide “Geheime Geschichte der
Rastatter Friedensverhandlungen in Verbinduog mit den Staatshandeln
dieser Zeit.” Von einem Schweizer, part vi.]
“But we will not allow them to prevent us from leaving Rastadt,”
said Roberjot, resolutely. “They will not dare to interfere with the
departure of the representatives of the French Republic!”
“The republic would take bloody revenge for such an outrage, and these
Germans are afraid of the anger of the republic!” exclaimed Jean Debry,
haughtily.
Bonnier violently shook his black mane, and a gloomy cloud settled on
his brow.
“Barbaczy’s hussars are encamped in front of the gates, and Victoria de
Poutet last night had another interview with Lehrbach and Barbaczy,” he
said. “If, like both of you, I had a wife and children with me, I should
not dare to depart without further guaranties.”
At this moment the door opened, and a footman handed Roberjot a letter
that had just arrived from the Prussian ambassador, Count Goertz.
Roberjot opened the letter and glanced over it. “The guaranties you
referred to, Bonnier, will soon be here,” he said, smiling. “It seems
the German ambassadors are sharing your apprehensions. They have drawn
up a joint letter to Colonel Barbaczy, requiring him to give them
a written pledge that there would be no interference with the free
departure of the French ambassadors, and that the safety of the latter
would not be endangered. Count Goertz, therefore, requests us not to
set out until a written reply has been made to the letter of the
ambassadors. Shall we delay our departure until then?”
“We will,” said Bonnier; “you will not derogate from your republican
dignity by consulting the safety of your wives and children. I may say
that, inasmuch as I have to take care of no one but myself, and as I
know that no care would be of any avail in my case.”
“What do you mean, my friend?” asked Jean Debry.
“I mean that I shall die to-day,” said Bonnier, solemnly.
Roberjot turned pale. “Hush,” he whispered; “let us say nothing about
this matter to the women. My wife had a bad dream last night; she saw me
weltering in my gore and covered with wounds, and she asserts that her
dreams are always fulfilled.”
“Roberjot, Bonnier, and Debry, may God have mercy on your poor souls!”
muttered Bonnier, in a low voice.
“I do not believe in dreams!” said Jean Debry, with a loud, forced
laugh, “and besides, my wife has had no bad dream whatever, and not been
warned by fate. Come, let us go to our ladies who are already clad in
their travelling-dresses. Let us tell them that we shall, perhaps, be
compelled to wait a few hours.”
But several hours elapsed, and the messenger the German ambassadors had
sent to Colonel Barbaczy’s headquarters did not return. Nearly all of
the German ambassadors made their appearance at the castle in order to
express to the representatives of the French republic their astonishment
and profound indignation at this disrespectful delay, and to implore
them not to set out until the message had arrived.
The French ambassadors themselves were undecided and gloomy; their
ladies were pacing the rooms with sad faces and tearful eyes. Every one
was in the most painful and anxious state of mind. The whole day passed
in this manner, and night set in when finally the messenger whom the
ambassadors had sent to Colonel Barbaczy, returned to Rastadt. But he
did not bring the expected written reply of the colonel. In its place,
an Austrian officer of hussars made his appearance; he repaired to
the Prussian Count Goertz, at whose house the other ambassadors were
assembled, and brought him a verbal reply from Count Barbaczy. The
colonel excused himself for not sending a written answer, stating that
a pressure of business prevented him from so doing. He at the same time
assured the count and the ambassadors that the French ministers could
safely depart, and that he would give them twenty-four hours for this
purpose. [Footnote: Vide Dohm, nach seinem Wollen und Handeln, von
Cronau, p. 600.]
The officer brought, however, an autograph letter from Barbaczy to the
French ministers, and he repaired to the castle in order to deliver it
to them.
This letter from Barbaczy contained the following lines:
“Ministers: You will understand that no French citizens can be tolerated
within the positions occupied by the Austrian forces. You will not be
surprised, therefore, that I am obliged to request you, ministers, to
leave Rastadt within twenty-four hours.”
“Barbaczy, Colonel.”
“Gernsbach, April 28, 1799.” [Footnote: Dohm preserved a copy of this
letter.--Ibid.]
“Well, what are we to do?” asked Roberjot, when the officer had left
them.
“We will set out,” said Jean Debry, impetuously.
“Yes, we will set out,” exclaimed his beautiful young wife, encircling
him with her arms. “The air here, it seems to me, smells of blood and
murder; and every minute’s delay redoubles our danger.”
“Poor wife, did they infect you, too, already with their evil
forebodings and dreams?” said Jean Debry, tenderly pressing his wife to
his heart. “God forbid that they should endanger a single hair of your
dear, beautiful head! I am not afraid for myself, but for the sake of my
wife and of my two little daughters. For you and for our friends here I
would like to choose the best and most prudent course.”
“Let us set out,” said Madame Roberjot; “the terrible dream last night
was intended to give us warning. Death threatens us if we remain here
any longer. Oh, my husband, I love nothing on earth but you alone; you
are my love and my happiness! I would die of a broken heart if I should
lose you! But no, no, not lose! We live and die together. He who kills
you must also take my life!”
“They shall not kill us, my beloved,” said Roberjot, feelingly; “life,
I trust, has many joys yet in store for us, and we will return to our
country in order to seek them there. Bonnier, you alone are silent. Do
not you believe also that we ought to set out to-night?”
Bonnier started up from his gloomy reverie. “Let us set out,” he said,
“we must boldly confront the terrors from which we cannot escape. Let us
set out.”
“Be it so!” shouted Roberjot and Jean Debry. “The republic will protect
her faithful sons!”
“And may God protect us in His infinite mercy,” exclaimed Madame
Roberjot, falling on her knees.
And Jean Debry’s wife knelt down by her side, drawing her little girls
down with her.
“Let us pray, my children, for your father, for ourselves, and for our
friends,” she said, folding the children’s hands.
While the women were praying, the men issued their last orders to the
servants and to the postilions.
At length every thing was in readiness, and if they really wished to set
out, it had to be done at once.
Roberjot and Jean Debry approached softly and with deep emotion their
wives, who were kneeling and praying still, and raised them tenderly.
“Now be strong and courageous--be wives worthy of your husbands,” they
whispered. “Dry your tears and come! The carriages are waiting for us.
Come, come, France is waiting for us!”
“Or the grave!” muttered Bonnier, who accompanied the others to the
courtyard where the carriages were standing.
The ambassadors with their wives and attendants had finally taken seats
in the carriages. Roberjot and his wife occupied the first carriage;
Bonnier, the second; Jean Debry with his wife and daughters, the third;
in the fourth, fifth, and sixth were the secretaries of legation, the
clerks and servants of the ambassadors.
The last coach-door was closed; a profound momentary silence succeeded
the noise and turmoil that had prevailed up to this time. Then the loud,
ringing voice of Roberjot asked from the first carriage, “All ready?”
“All ready!” was the reply from the other carriages.
“Then let us start,” shouted Roberjot, and his carriage immediately
commenced moving. The other five carriages followed slowly and heavily.
The night was chilly and dark. The sky was covered with heavy clouds.
Not the faintest trace of the moon, not a star was visible. In order
that they might not lose their way, and see the bridge across the Rhine,
a man, bearing a torch, had to precede the carriages. But the gale moved
the flame so violently that it now seemed near going out, and then again
flared up and cast a glare over the long procession of the carriages.
Then every thing once more became dark and gloomy and ominously still.
The torch-bearer, preceding the foremost carriage, vigorously marched
ahead on the road. All at once it seemed to him as though black figures
were emerging from both sides of the highway and softly flitting past
him. But assuredly he must have been mistaken; it could not have been
any thing but the shadows of the trees standing on both sides of the
road.
No, now he saw it again, quite plainly. The shadows were horsemen,
softly riding along on both sides of the highway. He raised his torch
and looked at the horsemen. There was quite a cavalcade of them.
Now they crossed the ditch and took position across the road, thus
preventing the carriages from passing on. The torch-bearer stood still
and turned around in order to shout to the postilions to halt. But only
an inarticulated, shrill cry escaped from his throat, for at the same
moment two of the horsemen galloped up and struck at him with their
flashing swords. He parried the strokes with his torch, his only weapon,
so that one of the swords did not hit him at all, while the other only
slightly touched his shoulder.
“What is the matter?” shouted Roberjot, in an angry voice, from the
first carriage.
The horsemen seized the arms of the torch-bearer and dragged him toward
the carriage. “Light!” they shouted to him, and quite a squad of merry
horsemen was now coming up behind them. When they dashed past the torch,
the frightened torch-bearer was able to see their wild, bearded faces,
their flashing eyes, and the silver lace on their uniforms.
The torch betrayed the secret of the night, and caused the Sczekler
hussars of Barbaczy’s regiment to be recognized.
They now surrounded the first carriage, shouting furiously, and
shattering the windows with their sabres.
“Minister Roberjot! Are you Minister Roberjot?” asked a dozen wild,
howling voices.
Roberjot’s grave and threatening face, illuminated by the glare of the
torch, appeared immediately in the aperture of the window. “Yes, I am
Roberjot,” he said, loudly; “I am the ambassador of France, and here is
the passport furnished me by the ambassador of the Elector of Mentz.”
He exhibited the paper, but the hussars took no notice of it; four
vigorous arms dragged Roberjot from the carriage, and before he had time
to stretch out his hand toward his pistols, the sabres of the hussars
fell down upon his head and shoulders.
A terrible yell was heard, but it was not Roberjot who had uttered it;
it was his wife, who appeared with pale and distorted features in the
coach door, hastening to her beloved husband, to save him or to die with
him.
But two stout arms kept her back--the arms of the valet de chambre who,
perceiving that his master was hopelessly lost, wanted to protect at
least his mistress from the murderous sabres of the hussars.
“Let me go, let me go; I will die with him!” she cried; but the faithful
servant would not loosen his hold, and, unable to reach her husband, she
had to witness his assassination by the hussars, who cut him with their
sabres until he lay weltering in his gore.
“He is dead!” shrieked his wife, and her wail aroused Roberjot once more
from his stupor. He opened his eyes and looked once more at his wife.
“Sauvez! sauvez!” he shouted, in a voice full of anguish. “Oh!--”
“What! not dead yet?” roared the hussars, and they struck him again.
Now he was dying. That loud, awful death-rattle was his last
life-struggle. The valet de chambre in order to prevent her from hearing
that awful sound, with his hands closed the ears of his mistress, who,
petrified with horror, was looking at her dying husband.
But she did not hear it; she had fainted in the servant’s arms. At this
moment a heavy hand was laid on his shoulder, and the wild, bearded face
of a hussar stared at him.
“Footman?” asked the hussar, in his broken Hungarian dialect. “Yes,
footman!” said the valet de chambre, in broken German.
The hussar smilingly patted his shoulder, and, with his other hand,
pulled the watch from his vest-pocket, kindly saying to him, “Footman,
stay here. No harm will befall him!” He then bent forward, and with
a quick grasp, tore the watch and chain from the neck of Roberjot’s
fainting wife.
His task was now accomplished, and he galloped to the second carriage,
to which the other hussars had just dragged the torch-bearer, and which
they had completely surrounded.
“Bonnier, alight!” howled the hussars, furiously--“Bonnier, alight!”
“Here I am!” said Bonnier, opening the coach door; “here--” They did
not give him time to finish the sentence. They dragged him from the
carriage, and struck him numerous blows amidst loud laughter and yells.
Bonnier did not defend himself; he did not parry a single one of their
strokes; without uttering a cry or a groan, he sank to the ground. His
dying lips only whispered a single word. That word was, “Victoria!”
The six hussars who crowded around him now stopped in their murderous
work. They saw that Bonnier was dead--really dead--and that their task
was accomplished. Now commenced the appropriation of the spoils, the
reward that had been promised to them. Four of them rushed toward the
carriage in order to search it and to take out all papers, valuables,
and trunks; the two others searched and undressed the warm corpse of
Bonnier with practised hands.
Then the six hussars rushed after their comrades toward the third
carriage--toward Jean Debry. But the others had already outstripped
them. They had dragged Debry, his wife, and his daughters from the
carriage; they were robbing and searching the lady and the children, and
cutting Jean Debry with their sabres.
He dropped to the ground; his respiration ceased, and a convulsive
shudder passed through the bloody figure, and then it lay cold and
motionless in the road.
“Dead! dead!” shouted the hussars, triumphantly. “The three men are
killed; now for the spoils! The carriages are ours, with every thing in
them! Come, let us search the fourth carriage. We will kill no more; we
will only seize the spoils!”
And all were shouting and exulting, “Ho for the spoils! for the spoils!
Every thing is ours!” And the wild crowd rushed forward, and Jean Debry
lay motionless, a bleeding corpse by the side of the carriage.
Profound darkness enveloped the scene of horror and carnage. The torch
had gone out; no human eye beheld the corpses with their gaping wounds.
The ladies had been taken into the carriages by their servants; the
hussars were engaged in plundering the three remaining carriages, the
inmates of which, however, forewarned in time by the shrieks and groans
that had reached them from the scene of Roberjot’s assassination,
had left and fled across the marshy meadows to the wall of the castle
garden. Climbing over it and hastening through the garden, they reached
the city and spread everywhere the terrible tidings of the assassination
of the ambassadors.