THE DEFENCE OF THE BODYGUARD
Word passed about at the stately tea _à l'Anglaise_ of the Princess de
Poix that there was danger at the Palace.
"Germain, my knight," whispered Cyrène at the harpsichord, the bright
tears in her eyes, "I must not keep you now. Go to the Queen. It is for
times of peril that descendants of chivalry were born."
Tenderly kissing her hand and saying adieu, Lecour drove to the Palace
and reported for service.
The great Hall of the Guards in the centre of the Palace faces the top
of the Marble Staircase. To the left a landing leads to the Hall of the
King's Guards and thence, to the apartment of the King; to the right
another to the Hall of the Queen's Guards and the chambers of Marie
Antoinette.
The Marble Staircase was approached by the Court of Marble, the smallest
and innermost courtyard of the vast château, looked out upon by the
royal apartments and paved with white marble. The exit from this was to
the Royal Court, whence through a grating to the Court of the Ministers,
and thence through the outer grating by the entrance gate to the Place
d'Armes.
Though the season was yet early in October, it was as gloomy and
forbidding a night as one in the worst of November. The darkness and
chill were aggravated by a wearisome drizzle. They were further
aggravated by the discomforts of an anxious situation. About fifty
Bodyguards, lying and sitting under arms in the Hall, were trying to
spend the night, or rather the early hours before dawn, entertaining
each other. They were mainly of the command of the Count de Guiche, then
in its turn of service, but a number among them wore cross-belts of
other companies, for the need had been pressing, and all within reach
had been hastily summoned. The reason for anxiety was a great invasion
of women from Paris on the afternoon of the previous day headed by "a
conqueror of the Bastille." A deputation of twelve of these women were
led to the King, who satisfied and pleased them by his kindness, but the
rest of the crowd, brandishing knives through the railing, accused these
of treachery and tried to hang them. Outside the Palace on the Place
d'Armes the numbers were increased by horde after horde of men marching
from the slums of Paris, armed with pikes, muskets, and hatchets, and
full of drink. After dark many had filled the streets, knocking at the
houses demanding food and money, and terrifying the town. The sentinels,
the Bodyguards, and the Flemish regiment had with difficulty rescued the
women of the deputation, kept the gates and held the mob at bay. They
were jeered at and even fired on, whereat one or two of the Bodyguards
had fired back. The filthy furies, drunken and degraded to an extent of
degradation almost unknown to-day, were especially foul-mouthed
regarding the poor Queen. As for Wife Gougeon, she had stood out on the
very floor of the Assembly, flourished her dagger and screamed "Where
can I find the Austrian?"
At length rain and night brought a certain cessation, and with them
hopes rose. The troops were withdrawn at eight. The main portion of the
Bodyguard were sent to Rambouillet in the vicinity, as they seemed to
excite antagonism among some companies of the National Guard or militia
of Versailles. About twelve in the evening, General Lafayette, of
American fame, came up at the head of the militia of Paris and took
command of the external defences of the château.
The mob were still, however, permitted to camp out on the Place d'Armes.
"What are they doing now?" a tired officer of the Bodyguards asked of
another, who had come in and was giving his dripping cloak to one of the
King's lackeys.
"They are mostly asleep, on the Place. It is all over hillocks of rags."
"In the rain?"
"So it seems; it does not wet that sort."
"They must be hungry."
"Not at all. They have each his or her bottle of drink; besides, they
roasted and ate our comrade's horse that they shot by the light of their
bonfire. It was looking on at a cannibal's feast to see them dancing
round it, men and women."
"More so had it been an ass's carcase, perhaps."
"Say a wolf's. If there is a breed of human wolves, I have had it proved
to me to-night. The difference between these and the kind in the
Menagerie is that it is we who are within the bars."
"You need not offer the breed as a novelty; I saw plenty of them at Eaux
Tranquilles."
The speakers were Grancey and Germain. The Baron's face was full of
indignation; Lecour's of platonic contempt.
The door of the Hall of the King's Guards opened, and the sentinels
saluted for a Duke, while the Prince of Luxembourg entered. The Guards
who were awake aroused their comrades. All sprang to their arms and
saluted.
"Gentlemen," said the Prince, "you will be glad to know that his Majesty
has such trust in your faithfulness that he is sleeping as quietly as
usual."
A shout of "Vive le Roi!" arose.
The Prince withdrew. From the opposite door--that of the Hall of the
Queen, now came out Monsieur d'Aguesseau, Mayor of the Guard, who was
making the disposition of sentries.
The contingent, who were still standing, turned to him with looks of
anxiety, and Lecour, as spokesman for the rest, said respectfully--
"How sleeps the Queen?"
"Her Majesty, alas! does not sleep. She starts up continually, haunted
by the foul insults of yesterday and the immense unmerited hatred of the
people of France. What a load for a woman to bear!"
The cry of "Vive la Reine!" which had been ready went forth only as a
low murmur.
"Gentlemen," said d'Aguesseau, "our duty may be grave before long.
General Lafayette has, it is true, assumed the external defence of the
Palace with the National Guard of Paris. At the same time, we must
remember that that Guard are now scattered among the churches of the
town and fast asleep, while the invaders are a countless multitude at
our doors, and we but a handful. On us depend, as on a thread, the lives
of our King and Queen and of all these helpless persons of the
household. Remember, sirs, that your time to die, the soldier's hour of
glory, may now have come."
A shoot of "Vive le Roi!" from every throat was again the response. It
echoed through the windows across the Court of Marble and down the
Great Staircase. It was memorable as the last loyal cry of the household
of Versailles.
"The hour has arrived to change guard," Mayor d'Aguesseau went on. "Will
you, Monsieur de Lincy, take command in the Hall of the Queen?"
D'Aguesseau passed on to inspect the precautions at other points of the
Palace.
No sooner had he left than the men disposed themselves with serious
faces for active work. A sympathetic feeling of devotion displayed
itself. Suddenly Des Huttes, the best voice in the company of Noailles,
struck up solemnly that tender reminiscence from the opera of "Richard
Coeur de Lion"--
"Oh, Richard, oh my King, the world forsaketh thee,"
and the Bodyguards, overcome with emotion, one and all stood still with
bended heads.
It was then about three o'clock.
In four hours' more the French Monarchy was to fall and the ancient
_régime_ to pass like a dream. The east wind dashed a terrible gust of
rain against the windows and shook their panes like a summons.
* * * * *
"Oh, Richard, oh my King, the world forsaketh thee," haunted Germain as
he paced the Hall of the Queen's Guards. Recent political events
connected with the drawing up of a national constitution, and the hunger
of the poor, which they naturally blamed on those in power, had, he
knew, raised deep animosity towards Louis XVI. and the Queen. Her
thoughtless life of gaiety in past days, and the greedy demands of her
friends the Polignacs, had made her particularly the mark of venomous
hate. As d'Aguesseau said, "what a load for a woman to bear!" The
thought raised in Lecour the deepest pity. Opposite him was the door of
the first antechamber, called the Grand Couvert, where had posted
Varicourt, and within it some dozen others. There Varicourt stood,
handsome and elegantly uniformed, at that beautiful door in that fine
hall. Yet behind all this elegance what misery! The Canadian could not
suppress the vision of the tortured Queen starting out of her sleep in
her chamber a few paces away. This suffering woman was in his charge--he
must be loyal to her and lay down his life before hers should be taken.
Well, he had faced death before--it had not yet quite come to that; but
he would be loyal and true. Oh, if he could only cross for a few minutes
to the Noailles mansion and have a word with Cyrène. Was she in danger
too? His heart ached with anxiety.
So the hours of the night passed.
A little before six, while he was resting on a bench and all seemed
quiet, he suddenly heard shouting. He was startled, for it was much
nearer than the Place d'Armes. Yes, there was no doubt of it; he heard a
pistol-shot close by, and at the same time he sprang to his feet. There
was a simultaneous stir in the Great Hall of the Guards, and de
Varicourt, at the entrance to the Queen's antechamber, rapidly drew his
sword. So did du Repaire, sentinel at the door to the Marble Staircase.
Germain ordered Miomandre de Ste. Marie, another faithful Guardsman, who
was posted at the door of the Great Hall, to go down the Marble
Staircase and bring back a report of the trouble.
It afterwards appeared that the two of Lafayette's Paris militiamen
posted at the outer gateway had betrayed their trust and let in the mob
of viragoes and armed brigands who pressed for admittance early in the
morning. Now commenced a season of terror in the Palace.
No sooner had Miomandre reached the head of the staircase, and Lecour
looked after him out of the open door, than they both saw the court
below alive with a lashing ocean of pikes and furious faces.
The two Swiss sentinels who kept the foot of the staircase had managed
to check the rush, and for a moment the brigands checked themselves to
get each a hack at an object they had thrown down. Lecour saw instantly
that this object was a man--a Bodyguard--who, as with a tremendous
effort he threw off his assailants and stood up, the streams of blood
pouring over his face, he recognised as poor Des Huttes. Germain's first
impulse was to bound down the steps to his rescue--but discipline did
its work and checked him. Should he leave his post, what would become of
the Queen? Des Huttes during the moment of this quick reflection, was
brained from behind by a man in a red cap, and fell, pierced with
countless pike-wounds. His eyes still moved when the rag-picker Gougeon
ran in, and, placing his foot on the chest, chopped the head from the
body with blows of an axe. In an instant it was stuck on the point of a
pike and triumphantly carried away.
Lecour, his brain on fire, drew back and steadied himself to retain
presence of mind.
An instant after he could hear the roar of the mob as it surged up and
the voice of Miomandre shouting to them, "My friends, you love your
King."
They rushed on Miomandre and tried to kill him as they had done Des
Huttes; but he was quick, and springing to the embrasure of a window,
defended himself, while the yelling booty-seekers, athirst for
easier-seized treasures, turned to press forward into the apartment of
the Queen. The attack came quickly, but Germain shut the door in time
and locked it, and thanks to the perfect make of the lock its bolt held
out against the onset. That could not long be, however, as he knew the
panels must give way before their axes.
"Stand firm, du Repaire!" he cried, and ran across the hall to where de
Varicourt was guarding the door of the Queen's antechamber. Before
passing in, he grasped the hand of the devoted Bodyguard, who understood
that his hour had come, crossed himself, and answered with a look of
unalterable devotion.
Germain closed the door of the antechamber lovingly and regretfully,
locked and bolted it.
The howling pack were but a few minutes in breaking in. He could hear
their shouts of triumph and the shameless cries of the women against
Marie Antoinette.
Astonished at finding themselves in the inside of the Palace, the first
comers were dumbfounded, but a red-nosed beggar in a red cap immediately
sprang towards de Varicourt, shouting, "This way to the Austrian!"
"Vive la Nation!" roared men who were looting the tapestry from the
benches.
"Death to the Sow!" was the shriek of Wife Gougeon.
"Death to the aristocrat!" shouted the Admiral with a devilish laugh,
leading the rush on de Varicourt.
The latter defended himself with all his strength, first with his
clubbed musket, then with his sword. For some seconds he kept the
murderers at bay, and it seemed to du Repaire, looking eagerly across
the hall, that after all the impossible might be accomplished, and the
valour of his comrade stem the accursed horde. To no purpose. As he
turned like lightning to deliver a thrust to the left, a blow from a
billhook on the right crushed his skull; he dropped, and his bleeding
body was instantly robbed and dragged out to the Place d'Armes.
Meanwhile du Repaire, inspired by the heroic conduct of de Varicourt,
took advantage of the momentary diversion to slip across and occupy his
fallen comrade's post. The assailants, some of the boldest of whom had
suffered from de Varicourt's sword, were astonished and daunted by the
sight of another Bodyguard in the same place.
"_Canaille!_ we know how to die!" he cried, and stood ready to strike
the first on-comer.
"So do we!" cried the Admiral, and struck at him, but tripped and was
pulled back.
"Save yourself, du Repaire, if you can," commanded Germain from within
the door.
Seizing the moment's confusion, du Repaire sprang through the weakest
part of the semicircle around him, and scattering the tramps in the rest
of the hall before him, reached the door of the Great Hall of the Guards
opposite, not without several wounds. The door was fortunately opened
and Grancey, who opened it, emptied his pistol into the foremost pursuer
and killed him, obtaining time to lock and bolt again.
The crowning instance of the spirit of the Bodyguard was now given.
Miomandre de Ste Marie, who had sheltered himself from the first rush of
the mob in the window embrasure at the head of the staircase, seeing the
crowd rush after du Repaire, and not knowing of the command to abandon
the post, sped over and stationed himself in the same position.
Meanwhile, during the few minutes in which all this took place, Germain
had opened the door of the Queen's drawing-room and said quietly to a
lady of honour, "Save the Queen; they want to kill her." The ladies of
honour bolted the drawing-room door, hurried to the Queen, hastily
dressed her, opened a secret door in a panel near her bed, and hurried
her by a passage to the chamber of the King.
Miomandre, meanwhile, was attacked like Varicourt and du Repaire.
Knocked down from behind with the butt of a musket, he would have been
despatched but for the scramble of the Galley men to rob his body of his
watch, and by the diversion of the rage of the crowd against his
companions shut in the Great Hall.
While Ste Marie lay insensible, those in the Great Hall were actively
piling up benches against the door and removing the stacks of arms to
the Oeil de Boeuf, which adjoined it, and where they proposed to make
their next stand in the way to the apartments of the King. The Count of
Guiche and the Prince of Luxembourg worked like the rest, and just as
the door crashed through the last of the weapons were brought into the
Oeil de Boeuf and its entrance closed. The Hall of the Courtiers seemed
to receive the unusual invasion with the inperturbability of a courtier.
One scene of bustling life appeared to suit it as well as another, even
though death were so near to follow. The little reserve were drawn up in
order, determined to fight it out there together.
And now a long, low sound was heard in the distance. It approached, and
as it grew the shouts of rage in the Great Hall ceased, and a roar of
scuttling feet was heard. Lafayette's National Guard were approaching,
and as the serried lines, advancing at the double, reached the Court of
Marble, their drum-beats suddenly burst into a thunderous roll, and the
Court, the staircase, and the halls were cleared of the cowardly rabble.
Such was the glorious defence of the Bodyguard. And so the Queen was
saved.
The Queen was saved; the King was saved; the household was saved--at
least for the present--but the monarchy was lost.
His Majesty left Versailles at one o'clock. The Queen, the Dauphin,
Madame Royale, Monsieur, Madame Elizabeth, the King's sister and Madame
de Tourzel, governess of the children of France, were in his Majesty's
carriage.
A hundred deputies of the Assembly in their carriages came next. The
advance guard, which was formed of a detachment of the brigands, set out
two hours earlier. In front of them Hache and Motte danced in triumph,
carrying the pallid heads of Des Huttes and de Varicourt aloft on their
pikes.
They stopped a moment at Sèvres in front of the shop of an unfortunate
hairdresser. They caught hold of the latter and forced him to dress the
gory heads; a task which made the poor man a hopeless maniac the same
evening.
The bulk of the Paris National Guard followed them closely. The King's
carriage was preceded by Wife Gougeon and the fishwomen and a rabble of
prostitutes, the vile refuse of their sex, all raving with fury and
wine.
Several rode astride upon cannon, boasting in the most horrible songs of
the crimes they had committed themselves or seen others commit. Those
who were nearest the carriage sang ballads, the allusions in which, by
means of their gestures, they applied to the Queen. In the paroxysms of
their drunken merriment these women stopped passengers, and pointing to
the carriage, howled in their ears, "Cheer up, friends, we shall no
longer be in want of bread; we bring the baker, the baker's wife, and
the baker's boy."
They pointed to waggons which followed, full of corn and flour, which
had been brought into Versailles, and formed a train, escorted by
Grenadiers and surrounded by women and bullies, some armed with pikes
and some carrying long branches of poplar. This favourite part of the
_cortège_ looked at some distance like a moving grove, amidst which
shone pike-heads and gun-barrels. Above and in front of the motley
procession which accompanied them, mounted high on one of the waggons,
rode Death himself, so the spectators thought, grinning, triumphing, and
directing the whole, in the shape of the skull-like countenance of the
Admiral of the Galley-on-Land.
Behind his Majesty's carriage were the remnant of the Bodyguard, some on
foot and some on horseback, most of them uncovered, all unarmed, and
worn out with hunger and fatigue. The Dragoons, the Flanders regiment,
the Hundred Swiss and the National Guards, preceded, accompanied, or
followed the file of carriages.
Lecour, weak with the night's anxiety and the frightful disappointment
of the day, had scarcely strength to drag himself along between two
Grenadiers, who from time to time supported him, and one of whose great
hairy caps he wore as a token of fraternity. All at once hell seemed to
have risen about him. He heard a united yell from many savage throats,
and saw a ring of red-capped brutes lunging and striking at himself, and
a little woman-fiend sprang at his breast and buried something sharp in
it.
The last thing of which he was conscious was the satanic revengefulness
of her eyes.