"Here," he said, "is the King of Naples, exile and fugitive, whom I
confide to your care. I do not speak of the possibility that some day he
may get back his crown, that would deprive you of the credit of your
fine action.... Now, be his guide--we will follow at a distance. March!"
The king and the lawyer set out at once together. Murat was dressed in a
blue coat-semi-military, semi-civil, buttoned to the throat; he wore
white trousers and top boots with spurs; he had long hair, moustache,
and thick whiskers, which would reach round his neck.
As they rode along he questioned his host about the situation of his
country house and the facility for reaching the sea in case of a
surprise. Towards midnight the king and Marouin arrived at Bonette; the
royal suite came up in about ten minutes; it consisted of about thirty
individuals. After partaking of some light refreshment, this little
troop, the last of the court of the deposed king, retired to disperse in
the town and its environs, and Murat remained alone with the women, only
keeping one valet named Leblanc.
Murat stayed nearly a month in this retirement, spending all his time in
answering the newspapers which accused him of treason to the Emperor.
This accusation was his absorbing idea, a phantom, a spectre to him; day
and night he tried to shake it off, seeking in the difficult position in
which he had found himself all the reasons which it might offer him for
acting as he had acted. Meanwhile the terrible news of the defeat at
Waterloo had spread abroad. The Emperor who had exiled him was an exile
himself, and he was waiting at Rochefort, like Murat at Toulon, to hear
what his enemies would decide against him. No one knows to this day what
inward prompting Napoleon obeyed when, rejecting the counsels of General
Lallemande and the devotion of Captain Bodin, he preferred England to
America, and went like a modern Prometheus to be chained to the rock of
St. Helena.
We are going to relate the fortuitous circumstance which led Murat to
the moat of Pizzo, then we will leave it to fatalists to draw from this
strange story whatever philosophical deduction may please them. We, as
humble annalists, can only vouch for the truth of the facts we have
already related and of those which will follow.
King Louis XVIII remounted his throne, consequently Murat lost all hope
of remaining in France; he felt he was bound to go. His nephew Bonafoux
fitted out a frigate for the United States under the name of Prince
Rocca Romana. The whole suite went on board, and they began to carry on
to the boat all the valuables which the exile had been able to save from
the shipwreck of his kingdom. First a bag of gold weighing nearly a
hundred pounds, a sword-sheath on which were the portraits of the king,
the queen, and their children, the deed of the civil estates of his
family bound in velvet and adorned with his arms. Murat carried on his
person a belt where some precious papers were concealed, with about a
score of unmounted diamonds, which he estimated himself to be worth four
millions.
When all these preparations for departing were accomplished, it was
agreed that the next day, the 1st of August, at five o'clock, a boat
should fetch the king to the brig from a little bay, ten minutes' walk
from the house where he was staying. The king spent the night making out
a route for M. Marouin by which he could reach the queen, who was then
in Austria, I think.
It was finished just as it was time to leave, and on crossing the
threshold of the hospitable house where he had found refuge he gave it
to his host, slipped into a volume of a pocket edition of Voltaire.
Below the story of 'Micromegas' the king had written: [The volume is
still in the hands of M. Marouin, at Toulon.]
Reassure yourself, dear Caroline; although unhappy, I am free. I am
departing, but I do not know whither I am bound. Wherever I may be my
heart will be with you and my children. "J. M."
Ten minutes later Murat and his host were waiting on the beach at
Bonette for the boat which was to take them out to the ship.
They waited until midday, and nothing appeared; and yet on the horizon
they could see the brig which was to be his refuge, unable to lie at
anchor on account of the depth of water, sailing along the coast at the
risk of giving the alarm to the sentinels.
At midday the king, worn out with fatigue and the heat of the sun, was
lying on the beach, when a servant arrived, bringing various
refreshments, which Madame Marouin, being very uneasy, had sent at all
hazards to her husband. The king took a glass of wine and water and ate
an orange, and got up for a moment to see whether the boat he was
expecting was nowhere visible on the vastness of the sea. There was not
a boat in sight, only the brig tossing gracefully on the horizon,
impatient to be off, like a horse awaiting its master.
The king sighed and lay down again on the sand.
The servant went back to Bonette with a message summoning M. Marouin's
brother to the beach. He arrived in a few minutes, and almost
immediately afterwards galloped off at full speed to Toulon, in order to
find out from M. Bonafoux why the boat had not been sent to the king. On
reaching the captain's house, he found it occupied by an armed force.
They were making a search for Murat.
The messenger at last made his way through the tumult to the person he
was in search of, and he heard that the boat had started at the
appointed time, and that it must have gone astray in the creeks of Saint
Louis and Sainte Marguerite. This was, in fact, exactly what had
happened.
By five o'clock M. Marouin had reported the news to his brother and the
king. It was bad news. The king had no courage left to defend his life
even by flight, he was in a state of prostration which sometimes
overwhelms the strongest of men, incapable of making any plan for his
own safety, and leaving M. Marouin to do the best he could. Just then a
fisherman was coming into harbour singing. Marouin beckoned to him, and
he came up.
Marouin began by buying all the man's fish; then, when he had paid him
with a few coins, he let some gold glitter before his eyes, and offered
him three louis if he would take a passenger to the brig which was lying
off the Croix-des-Signaux. The fisherman agreed to do it. This chance of
escape gave back Murat all his strength; he got up, embraced Marouin,
and begged him to go to the queen with the volume of Voltaire. Then he
sprang into the boat, which instantly left the shore.
It was already some distance from the land when the king stopped the man
who was rowing and signed to Marouin that he had forgotten something. On
the beach lay a bag into which Murat had put a magnificent pair of
pistols mounted with silver gilt which the queen had given him, and
which he set great store on. As soon as he was within hearing he shouted
his reason for returning to his host. Marouin seized the valise, and
without waiting for Murat to land he threw it into the boat; the bag
flew open, and one of the pistols fell out. The fisherman only glanced
once at the royal weapon, but it was enough to make him notice its
richness and to arouse his suspicions. Nevertheless, he went on rowing
towards the frigate. M. Marouin seeing him disappear in the distance,
left his brother on the beach, and bowing once more to the king,
returned to the house to calm his wife's anxieties and to take the
repose of which he was in much need.
Two hours later he was awakened. His house was to be searched in its
turn by soldiers. They searched every nook and corner without finding a
trace of the king. Just as they were getting desperate, the brother came
in; Maroum smiled at him; believing the king to be safe, but by the
new-comer's expression he saw that some fresh misfortune was in the
wind. In the first moment's respite given him by his visitors he went up
to his brother.
"Well," he said, "I hope the king is on board?"
"The king is fifty yards away, hidden in the outhouse."
"Why did he come back?"
"The fisherman pretended he was afraid of a sudden squall, and refused
to take him off to the brig."
"The scoundrel!"
The soldiers came in again.
They spent the night in fruitless searching about the house and
buildings; several times they passed within a few steps of the king, and
he could hear their threats and imprecations. At last, half an hour
before dawn, they went away. Marouin watched them go, and when they were
out of sight he ran to the king. He found him lying in a corner, a
pistol clutched in each hand. The unhappy man had been overcome by
fatigue and had fallen asleep. Marouin hesitated a moment to bring him
back to his wandering, tormented life, but there was not a minute to
lose. He woke him.
They went down to the beach at once. A morning mist lay over the sea.
They could not see anything two hundred yards ahead. They were obliged
to wait. At last the first sunbeams began to pierce this nocturnal mist.
It slowly dispersed, gliding over the sea as clouds move in the sky. The
king's hungry eye roved over the tossing waters before him, but he saw
nothing, yet he could not banish the hope that somewhere behind that
moving curtain he would find his refuge. Little by little the horizon
came into view; light wreaths of mist, like smoke, still floated about
the surface of the water, and in each of them the king thought he
recognised the white sails of his vessel. The last gradually vanished,
the sea was revealed in all its immensity, it was deserted. Not daring
to delay any longer, the ship had sailed away in the night.
"So," said the king, "the die is cast. I will go to Corsica."
The same day Marshal Brune was assassinated at Avignon.