Roger’s tentative bid to start an affaire with the Señorita d’Aranda was no more than a momentary impulse, brought about through the additional attraction lent her by the moonlight. No sooner was the carriage bowling down the avenue than she had passed entirely from his thoughts and his whole mind became occupied with the Queen.
He was already aware that during the past twenty minutes he had been very far from his normal self. That was partly due to the stunning suddenness with which his despair of escaping a long spell of imprisonment had been dissipated. But he felt that it must be something more than that which had caused him to use expressions of such extravagant devotion to Madame Marie Antoinette, and declare himself so instantly ready to undertake a mission for her.
He had got only so far in his musings when the carriage, having reached the entrance of the park, drew to a halt. The coachman lifted the little panel in its roof and, out of the darkness, his voice came down to Roger:
“Where do you wish me to drive you, Monsieur?”
It was a pleasant surprise that the man had no definite instructions; as Roger had vaguely anticipated being set down some ten miles south of Fontainebleau, then, for his own purposes, having to drive all the way back to Paris the following day.
“Can you take me as far as Paris?” he asked.
“Certainly, Monsieur,” replied the coachman. The little trap flipped to and they set off again.
Roger’s mind at once reverted to Madame Marie Antoinette; and, while he admitted to himself that the extraordinary fascination she exerted had been the cause of his pledging himself so wholeheartedly, he was relieved to think that he had nevertheless kept his head sufficiently well not to forget the interests of Mr. Pitt.
The Prime Minister was not dependent on him for information as to what happened when the States General met, the issue of fresh edicts by the Court, a change of Ministers or renewed resistance by the parliaments to the Royal Authority. All that, and much more, he would learn from the official despatches that the Duke of Dorset sent at least once a week to the Duke of Leeds at the Foreign Office. Roger’s province was to collect special information, particularly about the private lives and intentions of the principal protagonists in the coming struggle. Of these the King and Queen were clearly by far the most important; so if by undertaking a secret journey for the latter he could return from it with the prospect of being given her full confidence, his absence for some weeks from the storm-centre should more than repay him later for the loss of any smaller fish that might have swum into his net had he remained in Paris.
All the same, he wondered now if he would have been able to resist acceding to her request had it involved him in doing something contrary to the interests of his own mission. He thought he would, but was by no means certain; for he was conscious that he had been near bewitched while in her presence. Her beauty was incontestable; and, from the time of his first sight of her at quite a distance several years before, he had always thought of her as one of the most beautiful women he had ever set eyes on. But it was not that alone. He recalled an occasion when Mr. Horace Walpole had dined at Amesbury House, and how he had raved about her, saying that she had the power of inspiring passionate and almost uncontrollable adoration. Roger understood now what the distinguished wit and man of letters had meant; for he too had come under her spell and experienced the strange, effortless way in which she could move and trouble a man’s spirit.
In view of her extraordinary charm, integrity and kindness, it seemed difficult to understand how it was that she had become so hated by her people. On her arrival in France, in 1770, as a young girl of fourteen to marry the Dauphin, who was some fifteen months older than herself, the populace had gone wild with excitement and admiration of her beauty. Cities and towns had rivalled each other in sending her rich gifts, and at every public appearance she made she received the most enthusiastic ovations. Yet gradually her popularity had waned until she had now become the most hated woman in all Europe.
Such youthful follies and extravagances as those of which she had been guilty had not cost the country one hundredth part of the sums Louis XV had squandered on his mistresses; and it was not until quite recently, when the dilatoriness and indecision of her husband had threatened to bring ruin to the State, that she had played any part in politics. Nevertheless, all classes, with the exception of her little circle of friends, held her responsible for the evil condition into which France had fallen.
Roger could put it down only to deliberate misrepresentation of her character and acts by those secret enemies of whom she had spoken, and he knew that they were no figment of her imagination. During his stay in Paris he had traced numerous vile calumnies against her back to the Duc d’Orléans, and he felt certain that this cousin of the King would stop at nothing to bring about her ruin.
It occurred to him then that the Duke probably knew that the Queen had written the highly confidential letter he was carrying to her brother. She had said that the Marquis de St. Huruge had recommended de Roubec to her as a messenger, and it seemed unlikely that he would have set about finding one for her without first ascertaining where she wished the man to go. So the odds were that de St. Huruge had known de Roubec’s destination to be Florence, and that would be quite enough for him to make a shrewd guess at the general contents of the despatch. It was just possible that he had not been aware of de Roubec’s true character, but Roger doubted that; and, if the Marquis had known, it proved him to be a traitor. Knowledge of what the Queen had written to her brother could be of no value to an ordinary nobleman, but in the hands of His Highness of Orléans it might prove a trump card for her undoing; so if de St. Huruge had planned to secure the despatch it could only be because he intended to pass it on to someone else, and, in the circumstances, everything pointed to that person being His Highness.
Assuming that there had been a plot to get hold of the letter, Roger argued, as it had miscarried, by this time de Roubec would have reported his discomfiture to de St. Huruge, and the Marquis would have told the Duke; but there was no reason to suppose that they would be prepared to accept their failure as final, any more than that the Queen should have abandoned her intention of sending her despatch. She had said that she was surrounded by spies, so although she might no longer trust de St. Huruge, others about her person who were secretly in the pay of d’Orléans might have been primed to do all in their power to find out whom she would next select as her courier to Tuscany. Evidently she feared something of the kind or she would not have taken such elaborate precautions to conceal her choice of a new messenger, and his departure.
Roger felt that in that she had shown considerable skill; for after having seen him marched away between guards it was highly unlikely that any member of her Court would suspect her of having entrusted him with anything. Nevertheless, to give him the letter she had had to slip out of the Palace late at night; and, if there was an Orleanist spy among her women, it was quite possible that she had been followed. If so he might have been seen leaving or entering the carriage when it was drawn up near the little pavilion, and recognised; in which case her stratagem had by now been rendered entirely worthless, as news of the matter would soon reach the Duke.
Even if such were the case, and the Queen’s enemies knew the direction he had taken, it seemed unlikely that they would have time to arrange to lay an ambush for him before he reached Paris, but he felt that from then on he ought to regard himself as in constant danger from attack, and take every precaution against being caught by surprise.
Had he been entirely his own master, he would not have returned to Paris at all, but there were several matters in connection with his work for Mr. Pitt that required his attention in the capital before he could take the road to Italy with a clear conscience. All the same, he decided that he would lie very low while in Paris, both to prevent as far as possible such people as believed him to be in the Bastille becoming disabused about that, and in case the Orleanists were on his track.
It was with this in mind that, soon after four in the morning, when the carriage reached the village of Villejuif, just outside Paris, Roger told the coachman not to drive right into the city but to take him to some quiet, respectable inn in its south-western suburbs.
Although dawn had not yet come, and only a faint greyness in the eastern sky heralded its approach, the barrier was already open to let through a string of carts and waggons carrying produce to the markets. The coachman was evidently familiar with the quarter as, having passed the gate, he drove without hesitation through several streets into the Faubourg St. Marcel and there set Roger down at a hostelry opposite the royal factory where the Gobelins tapestries were made. Having thanked the man Roger knocked up the innkeeper, had himself shown to a room and went straight to bed.
When he awoke it was nearly midday. His first act was to take the packet entrusted to him by the Queen from beneath his pillow and stare at it. Already, the night before, he had been considerably worried on the score of a fine point of ethics in which the possession of it involved him, but he had put off taking any decision until he had slept upon the matter. Now, sleep on it he had, and he knew that he must delay no longer in facing up to this very unpleasant dilemma.
As an agent of the British Government who had been specially charged, among other matters, to endeavour to ascertain the Queen’s views on the course that events might take and the personalities most likely to influence that course, it was clearly his duty to open the despatch and make himself acquainted with its contents. In fact, had he prayed for a miracle to aid him in that respect, and his prayer had been granted, Heaven could hardly have done more than cast the packet down with a bump at his feet.
On the other hand he felt the strongest possible repugnance to opening the packet, in view of the fact that the Queen herself had given it into his hands, believing him to be entirely worthy of her trust.
For over a quarter-of-an-hour he turned the packet this way and that, agonisingly torn between two loyalties; then, at length, his ideas began to clarify. His paramount loyalty was to his own country, and had this beautiful foreign Queen asked him to do anything to the prejudice of Britain he knew that he would have refused her. More, in undertaking to act as her messenger he had been influenced, at least to some extent, by the thought that by doing so he would win her confidence. But why did he wish to win her confidence? Solely that he might report how her mind was working to Mr. Pitt. And here, in the letter he held, he had, not just stray thoughts that she might later have confided to him, but her carefully considered opinion, under his hand already. Surely it was to strain at a gnat and swallow a camel, to deliver the letter unopened then return to Versailles with the deliberate intention of spying on her afterwards.
There remained the fact that he had given her his word that he would protect the letter with his life from falling into the hands of her enemies. But Mr. Pitt was excellently disposed towards her and would certainly not allow the contents of her letter to be known to anyone who wished her harm. As an additional safeguard he could write to Mr. Pitt, relating the circumstances in which the letter had come into his possession, and requesting that the copy of it should be for his eye alone. The Prime Minister was too honourable a man not to appreciate the delicacy of the matter and strictly observe such a request.
Getting out of bed Roger took his travelling knife from his breeches pocket, lit the bedside candle with his tinder box, and, having heated the blade of the knife in the flame, began gently to prise up one of the heavy seals on the letter. After twenty minutes’ cautious work he had raised three of the seals without breaking any of them, so was able to lift the flap of the envelope and draw out the twenty or more sheets covered with writing that it contained. One glance at the document was enough to show him that it was in code.
He was not at all surprised at that, and had half expected it, as he knew that the members of all royal families habitually conducted their private correspondence with one another in cipher. But such ciphers could be broken with comparative ease, and although the circumstances deprived him of learning the Queen’s outlook he knew that it would not long prevent Mr. Pitt from doing so.
Returning the papers to their envelope, he put the whole in a deep pocket in the lining of his coat, then he proceeded to dress, and go downstairs to the coffee-room. There he ordered an extremely hearty breakfast, which he ate with scarcely a thought as to its constituents but considerable relish. Having done he informed the landlord that he would be requiring his room for at least one, and perhaps two, nights, after which he went out and, knowing that he would have difficulty in finding a hackneycoach in that unfashionable district, took the first omnibus he saw that was going in the direction of central Paris.
At the Pont Neuf he got out, walked across the point of the Isle de la Cité and on reaching the north bank of the Seine turned left along it, all the while keeping a sharp look-out to avoid any chance encounter with some acquaintance who might recognise him. Having passed under the southern façade of the Louvre he entered the gardens of the Palais des Tuileries. There, he picked eleven leaves and a single twig from a low branch of one of the plane trees and inserted them in an envelope he had brought for the purpose.
Continuing his walk he traversed the gardens, came out in the Rue St. Honoré and turned west along it. He had not proceeded far when he encountered a mob of some thirty rough-looking men who formed a ragged little procession, moving in the opposite direction. A foxy-faced fellow somewhat better dressed than the others led the group, carrying a placard on which had been scrawled: “Help us to choke him with his fifteen sols. Down with the oppressors of the poor.” Beside him a woman with matted black hair was beating a tattoo on a small drum, and several of their comrades were calling on the passers-by to join them.
Throughout most of the country the elections had now been completed but Paris was far behind and the contests were still being fought with considerable high feeling; so Roger assumed that the little band of roughs were on their way to a political meeting. Soon after passing them he went into a barber’s shop and asked for Monsieur Aubert.
The proprietor came out of a back room and greeted Roger civilly as an old acquaintance; upon which he produced the envelope containing the eleven leaves and the single twig from his pocket and said:
“I pray you, Monsieur Aubert, to give this to you-know-who, when he comes in tomorrow morning.”
The barber gave him an understanding smile, pocketed the envelope and bowed him out of the shop.
Having no desire to linger in a quarter where he might run into other people whom he knew, Roger hailed a passing hackney-coach, and told the driver to take him out to Passy, but to stop on the way at the first stationer’s they passed.
At the stationer’s he purchased some sheets of fine parchment, some tracing paper, and several quill pens, all of which had been sharpened to very fine points; then he continued on his way.
The coach took him along the north bank of the Seine and round its great bend to the south-west, where the narrow streets gave way to houses standing in their own gardens and then the open country. After proceeding some way through fields it entered the pleasant village of Passy, where Roger directed the coachman to a charming little house. Getting out he told the man that he might be there only a few minutes or for a couple of hours but in the latter case he would pay him well for waiting; then he walked up the neat garden path and pulled the bell.
The door was opened by a man-servant in dark livery, of whom Roger enquired if his master had yet returned from the country. To his great satisfaction the answer was in the affirmative and the owner of the house at home; so he gave his name to the servant, and was shown into a handsomely furnished parlour on the ground floor, that he had come to know well when he had been living in Paris two years earlier.
While he waited there for a few moments he congratulated himself on having run his old friend to earth. He had been bitterly disappointed at his failure to do so a fortnight before, owing to his belief that the man he had come to see could, if he would, give him a shrewder forecast of what was likely to happen when the States General met than anyone else in the whole of France. Had it not been for that he would never have come out to Passy today; but he had felt that he must make a final effort to secure this interview, even at the price of the news getting about that he was again a free man; as before leaving for Italy he had to make out a final report for Mr. Pitt.
The door opened to disclose a slim, youngish man of middle height, richly dressed in violet silk and leaning on a malacca cane. His face was thin and aristocratic, its haughty expression being redeemed by a dryly humorous mouth, lively blue eyes and a slightly retroussé nose. He had, until quite recently, been known as Monsieur l’Abbé de Périgord, he was now Bishop of Autun, and in time to come was to bear the titles of Duc de Bénévent, Prince de Talleyrand, Arch-Chancellor of Europe.
Roger’s engaging smile lit up his bronzed face, as he bowed. “I trust that you have not forgotten me, Monseigneur l’Evéque?”
“Mon ami; how could I ever do that?” replied the Bishop with his accustomed charm. Then limping into the room he waved Roger to a chair, sat down himself, and added in his unusually deep and sonorous voice: “But tell me, where have you sprung from? Have you but just crossed from England, or have you been for some time in France?”
“I have only this morning been let out of the Bastille,” lied Roger glibly.
“Ho! Ho!” exclaimed the prelate. “And in what way did you incur His Majesty’s displeasure to the point of his affording you such unwelcome hospitality?”
“ ’Twas that old affair of de Caylus. I thought the charges against me long-since withdrawn and the whole matter forgotten; but I proved mistaken. On going for a change of air to Fontainebleau I was recognised by some members of the Court and found myself clapped into prison.”
“Were you there long?”
“Nay; though I experienced all the distress of mind occasioned by believing that I might be. Evidently it was felt that after such a lapse of time a single night’s imprisonment would be sufficient to impress upon me how unpleasant a much longer stay would be should I err again. When I had breakfasted the Governor came to tell me that simultaneously with receiving the order for my incarceration he had had instructions to let me out in the morning.”
“You were lucky to get off so lightly; and most ill-advised to return to France without first making certain that the order for your arrest had been cancelled. Monsieur de Crosne’s people have a long memory for cases such as yours.”
Roger made a wry grimace. “I did not find it in the least light to spend a night in a cell imagining that I was to be kept there, perhaps for years. And ’twas not the Lieutenant of Police sent me there. The people I saw at Fontainebleau, with one exception, proved most sympathetic; so I would, I think, have escaped this extremely unpleasant experience had it not been for the malice of the Queen.”
“Ah!” murmured de Périgord with a sudden frown. “So you fell foul of that interfering woman, eh?”
Roger was well aware of the strong animosity that his host, not altogether without cause, bore the Queen, and he had deliberately played upon it. Only three days before, too, he had had ample confirmation that the dislike was mutual from the Queen stigmatising his friend as “that unworthy priest”. With a cynical little smile he remarked:
“I well remember you telling me how Her Majesty intervened to prevent your receiving the Cardinal’s Hat that His Holiness had promised you on the recommendation of King Gustavus of Sweden; but I had thought your animus against her might have softened somewhat since they have given you a Bishopric.”
“Given!” echoed de Périgord, with a sneer. “Save the mark! And what a miserable Bishopric at that! I wot not if Their Majesties resented most having to appoint me to it or myself receiving such a mess of pottage. They did so only because my father when on his death-bed eighteen months ago made it a last request, so it was one which they could scarce refuse. As for myself, I am now thirty-four, and have had better claims than most to a mitre for these ten years past. On the King belatedly agreeing to my preferment he might at least have given me the Archbishopric of Bourges, which was vacant at the time. But no, he fobs me off with Autun, a see that brings me in only a beggarly twenty-two thousand livres a year.”
At that moment the man-servant entered carrying a tray with a bottle in an ice-bucket and two tall glasses.
“You will join me in a glass of wine, will you not?” said the Bishop. “At this hour one’s palate is still fresh enough to appreciate une tête de cuvée, and I believe you will find this quite passable.”
It was in fact a Grand Montrachet of the year ’72, and in its golden depths lay all the garnered sunshine of a long-past summer. Having sipped it, Roger thanked his host for the joy of sharing such a bottle. Then, when the servant had withdrawn, he reverted to their previous conversation by remarking with a smile:
“ ’Tis indeed sad that Their Majesties’ narrow-mindedness should have deprived Your Grace of enjoying the best of both worlds.” It was as tactful a reference as could be made to the fact that de Pèrigord had only himself to blame for being passed over, since, even in this age of profligacy, his immoralities had scandalised all Paris, whereas the King and Queen were notoriously devout. But the Bishop took him seriously, and protested.
“Mon ami, to mix up one world with the other is to ignore reality. Like hundreds of other ordained priests—yes, and many of them high dignatories like myself—I was not consulted when put into the Church, and felt no calling whatever for it. Women, scripture tells us, were created for the joy of man, and to deny us our right to the enjoyment of them is, therefore, clearly against the will of God, let alone Nature. Since we are forbidden to marry we resort to other measures, and where is the harm in that? From time immemorial the Kings of France have known and condoned it. And I count it most unfair that the fact that I have been more fortunate than many in securing those enjoyments should be held against me.
“On the other hand, in my role of Agent General to the Clergy of the Province of Tours I was zealous in my duties and proved myself a capable administrator. So much so that when the subject of my nomination to a see came before the King I had the full support of the leading Churchmen in France, who made strong representations to His Majesty in my favour, and urged that my love affairs should be overlooked as no more than youthful peccadilloes.”
“Am I to take it, then, that you have now become a model of rectitude?” Roger grinned.
De Périgord grinned back. “Far from it, I fear. And I have no more liking for playing the Churchman than I had of old. But you may have noticed the suit I am wearing. I found the violet robes of a Bishop most becoming to me, so as a graceful concession to the Church I had some lay garments made of the same colour.”
“How did your flock take that?” asked Roger. “For I sought you out when I first arrived in Paris, some three weeks back, only to learn that you were absent on a visit to your see.”
“Ah,” sighed the Bishop. “That was a serious business, and I could afford to take no chances of giving offence by my preference for lay attire. Believe it or not, for a whole month I played the dignified Churchman. But unfortunately I was so out of practice that at one High Mass I forgot the ritual.” He laughed, and went on: “I had never visited my see before, feeling that it was quite sufficient to send them from time to time a pastoral letter that positively stank of piety; and I pray God that I may never have to go there again. But this visit was essential, as I wished to get myself elected to represent the clergy of the diocese at the forthcoming meeting of the States General.”
“From the news-sheets I gather that you succeeded, and I offer Your Grace my felicitations.”
“A thousand thanks.” De Périgord gracefully inclined his head. “The result, though, was a foregone conclusion. I gave the poor wretches of clergy dinners the like of which they had never seen, and flattered every woman of influence into the belief that I wanted to sleep with her. But once elected I cared not a fig for what any of them thought of me. In fact, so little did I care that, being near desperate to get back to the civilised air of Paris, I shook the dust of Autun off my feet and drove off in my coach at nine o’clock on the morning of Easter Sunday.”
The conversation having got round to the States General, Roger had no intention of letting it wander away again, so he said:
“There have been so many postponements of the meeting of the States, that one begins to doubt if it will ever assemble.”
“You need have no fear on that score,” De Périgord assured him quickly, “and the postponements were quite unavoidable. As an Englishman you can have little idea of what this meeting means to France, and the innumerable questions which have had to be decided before it could be brought about at all. Not only have the States not been convened for seven generations, but when last called together they were by no means representative of the nation; and in the present crisis to summon any assembly that was not would have been completely futile. In consequence nearly all ancient precedent was found to be worse than useless. It is in fact the first general election that France has ever had, so we had to work out the principles upon which it was to be held from the very beginning. I spent several months last year assisting Monsieur Necker to do so, and the problem positively bristled with difficulties,”
“What is your opinion of Monsieur Necker?” interjected Roger.
“He is an extremely capable financier but a most incapable statesman,” replied de Périgord succinctly. “No one short of a financial genius could have kept the Treasury solvent during these many months it has taken to arrange the elections; but in all other respects he is a mediocre man. His mind is not big enough to grasp the magnitude of the issues at stake, and his Liberal leanings are inspired by sentiment rather than any true understanding of the needs of the nation. A year ago I placed considerable hopes in him; but I have come to know him better since, and soon perceived that vanity governs nine-tenths of his actions. Were it not that when faced with a crisis he often takes the shrewd advice of his daughter I am convinced that long before this the public would have recognised him for what he is—a man of straw.”
“By ‘his daughter’ I take it you refer to Madame de Staël?”
“Yes. He has but one; and I count her far his superior in intelligence. She is a brilliant woman and should have done better for herself than to marry the Swedish Minister here. ’Tis a thousand pities that matters between her and your Mr. Pitt came to naught.”
“Mr. Pitt!” exclaimed Roger. “I had never thought of him as a marrying man.”
“No doubt he has found himself too fully occupied in recent years to concern himself with matrimony. But when he paid his only visit to this country, in ’83, I can assure you that the project of his espousing Madamoiselle Necker was broached, for he told me so himself. Monsieur Necker, although very rich, was no more than Sub-Controller of the Finances at the time, and an alliance with Lord Chatham’s brilliant younger son would have been a strong card for his advancement; so both he and his wife were eager for the match. Mr. Pitt, too, was by no means disinclined to it. But I believe the young lady had other views, and it was on that account that matters got no further.”
“You amaze me. But please continue with what you were telling me of Monsieur Necker’s character. It seems from what you say that there is little likelihood of his being able to dominate the States General.”
De Périgord shook his head. “Far from it. And his task will be rendered no more easy from the fact that both the King and the Queen distrust him. In that, for once, they are right. His popularity with the masses has gone to his head, and to retain the favour of the mob himself he is capable of advising them to commit any folly.”
“Then unless the King makes a change of Ministers it looks as if the deputies will be given free rein. Which among them do you consider are likely to prove the leading spirits?”
“It is impossible to say. ’Tis clear too that you do not yet appreciate the complete novelty of the situation. As I was remarking a while back, no election even remotely similar to this has ever been held in France before. Only the very poorest persons, who pay no taxes at all, have been excluded from the franchise, so the total number of voters is near six million. But they do not vote directly for the deputies who will represent them in the States. The electoral machinery is of an incredible complexity, and final agreement on it was reached only after months of bitter wrangling. Many cities stood out for making their own arrangements and the system in some provinces differs from that in others. But, in the main, groups of people, varying widely in numbers, vote for somebody to represent them in a local assembly, and it is these assemblies which in turn elect the deputies.
“Such a loose arrangement means that all sorts of strange characters will arrive at Versailles next month. One thing is certain: not even the names of most of them will be known to any of the others. Yet any one of them may prove a man of destiny whose name will soon be known throughout all Europe.”
Roger nodded. “You are, of course, speaking of the Third Estate; but what of the first two Orders? Surely they will also include many able men, and men of far wider experience; so is it not highly probable that some among them are likely to become the new leaders of the nation?”
“Their assemblies will prove almost as chaotic. It is estimated that there are some one hundred and fifty thousand clergy in France, and that the nobles total about the same number; for the latter include all the lesser nobility, which in England you term your gentry. Yet each of these great bodies of electors will be represented by only three hundred-odd deputies. In the elections of the clergy many high dignitaries have been passed over and a considerable number of curés who have never before left their villages have been returned. The same applies to the nobles. More than half of those so far elected are poor country dwellers whose fortune consists of little but a few acres of land and a coat of arms. And the Nobility of the Robe, which you might term the law-lords, who are undoubtedly the class most fitted to give an opinion on the matters we shall be called on to consider, are hardly represented at all.”
The Bishop offered his snuff-box; took a pinch himself, held it for a moment under the slightly retroussé nose that gave his face such piquancy, made a graceful gesture of flicking away the grains with a lace handkerchief, then went on:
“Moreover, I greatly doubt if either of the first two Orders will be in any situation to influence the Third. On ancient precedent all three should have had an equal number of representatives; and had I been the King I would have stood out for that, even had it meant calling out my troops. But the weak fool gave way to popular clamour, as usual, and assented to the agitators’ demands that the Third Estate should be allowed to send deputies to Versailles that equalled in numbers the other two together. Since it is certain that many of the poorer clergy and nobility will side with the Third Estate, and few, if any, of them with the other Orders, it seems to me inevitable that the natural defenders of the royal prerogative are doomed to defeat from the very outset.”
“But I thought the three Orders were to deliberate separately,” Roger demurred. “If so, you will still be two to one.”
“That is the present arrangement; but how long will it hold good when put into practice?” asked de Périgord darkly.
After a moment’s silence, Roger said: “From what you tell me, when the States do meet they will add up to a fine penn’orth of all sorts, so out of it should come some original ideas of merit.”
“Later, perhaps; but not to begin with, as all the deputies must, in theory, voice only the views expressed in their cahiers. The King has not convened the States to deliberate upon certain measures that his Ministers will put before them. He has been idiotic enough to ask everyone in the country to advise him how to get it out of the mess that it is in. So hundreds of thousands of know-alls have taken upon themselves the role of acting as his Ministers-designate overnight. For the past six months every group of voters has become a heated debating society, and the most determined members of each have drawn up programmes which their elected representatives took with them to the local assemblies. In the assemblies, once more, each separate cahier has been the subject of violent dispute, and at length the salient points in all have been combined in still longer cahiers for each deputy. The deputies will bring these cahiers to Versailles as their instructions from their constituents, and they have no legal right to depart from them.”
Roger nodded. “Of that I was aware; but surely the cahiers, being the consensus of opinion of every thinking man in France, must contain many new proposals of value?”
“From those I have so far seen, they contain far fewer than one would expect. Most of the originals emanating from the peasantry were completely valueless. Naturally, such people are utterly lacking in every kind of knowledge outside their local affairs. Apart from the childish demand that all taxes should be abolished, and the two senior Orders deprived of their manorial rights, they contain little other than such requests as that His Majesty should be graciously pleased to order the cleaning out of the village ditch. As to the others, they are almost universally of a pattern, modelled upon prototypes which were widely circulated in pamphlet form, having first been drafted by men such as Monsieur l’Abbé Sieyès.”
“What think you of Sieyès?” Roger enquired.
“I have no personal liking for him. He is a dry, withered little man to whom nature gave a cold, calculating brain instead of a heart. Beyond self-interest he has few passions, except for his bitter hatred of aristocracy in all its forms. As a Churchman he is no better than myself, and his own Order passed him over in the elections. But I understand that in view of his great services to the opponents of absolutism he is being permitted to offer himself for election as one of the deputies for Paris; so no doubt he will secure a seat in the Third Estate.”
The Bishop paused to refill the wine-glasses, then went on. “As an Englishman you may not have seen his pamphlet which began: ‘What is the Third Estate? Everything. What has it been until now in the political order? Nothing. What does it ask? To be something.’ Its circulation ran into many thousands and instantly placed him in the forefront of the struggle for reform. I would not trust him an inch, and do not believe that he has the courage required to become a great leader; but if we achieve a Constitution he may go far. His specimen cahier has certainly exerted an immense influence on the drafting of a high proportion of those which will be brought to Versailles.”
“And what of your own?” smiled Roger.
De Périgord laughed. “I have no worries on that score, for I drafted it myself.”
“It would interest me greatly to hear its contents.”
“Mon ami, I would not dream of boring you with it. ’Tis full of the the sort of clap-trap that fools swallow readily, and I have no intention of giving it another thought.”
“Tell me what other men besides Monsieur l’Abbé Sieyès you think likely to make their mark.”
“Malouet should stand out from the integrity of his character, if men of moderate views are listened to. Mounier also, for he is the best-known politician in France, and esteemed an oracle on all questions of parliamentary procedure. Then there are Dupont de Nemours, the economist, Bailly, the much-respected astronomer, Louis de Narbonne and Clermont-Tonnerre, all of whom you will recall having met here when you used to frequent my breakfast parties, and all men of considerable ability. But, as I have already told you, the potentialities of the great majority of the deputies-elect are still entirely unknown to us here in Paris.”
“You make no mention of the Comte de Mirabeau.”
“I thought it unnecessary. Honore Gabriel Riquetti stands head and shoulders above all the others I have mentioned, not only physically but mentally. As his cantankerous old father, the Marquis, refused to give him even the small fief required for him to qualify for election to the Second Estate, he stood for the Third at both Marseilles and Aix. Both cities elected him and he has chosen to sit for the latter. Whatever may be the fate of other deputies, in an assembly resembling the Tower of Babel from everyone wanting to air his opinions at once, you may be certain that de Mirabeau will not allow himself to be howled down.”
“Think you he has the qualities to make himself a great leader?”
For once de Périgord hesitated, his smooth forehead wrinkling into a frown; then he said: “ ’Tis difficult to say. All the world knows that the fellow is a born scamp. That he has spent several years of his life in a variety of prisons is not altogether his own fault, as his father pursued him with the utmost malice, and consigned him to them on a number of lettres de cachet. But whenever he was out of prison he lived in a most shady fashion, resorting to many a degrading shift in order to get money to gratify his passions. I doubt if his immoralities have actually been greater than my own but he has certainly conducted them with greater folly. He deserted his wife and abducted that of a Noble of the Robe. Then he deserted her and ran away with a young woman from a Convent who was near becoming a nun.
“I believe him to be honest and a true patriot. He is certainly a man of great intellectual gifts and fierce determination. I am sure that he would shrink from saying, writing or doing nothing which he believed to be in the interests of his cause. But the Riquetti are of Italian origin, and his hot southern blood goes to that great head of his at times, and I fear that the violence of his passions may prove his undoing.”
“Great as is his popularity with the masses,” Roger remarked, “one can hardly imagine that, should the King grant a Constitution, he would be inclined to entrust a man having such a history with the formation of a Government.”
A cynical smile twitched the corners of the Bishop’s lips, as he asked: “Who can tell, mon ami, how much say the King will be allowed in the choice of his future Ministers?”
“You feel convinced then that the States will not only succeed in forcing him to grant a Constitution, but reduce him to a cipher into the bargain?”
De Périgord nodded. “I do. I think the monarchy, decadent as it has become, rests upon too secure a foundation to be overthrown, and none but a handful of extremists would wish it. But once the States meet you may be certain that they will not rest content with any half-measures.”
“I agree with what you say about the monarchy, but what of the present occupant of the throne? Is there not a possibility that the Duc d’Orléans may attempt to supplant him; or at least get himself made Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom, with the powers of a Regent?”
The expressive eyes of the wily Churchman suddenly became quite vacant, then in a casual tone he replied: “His Highness of Orléans undoubtedly has ambitions to play a greater part in affairs of State, but I can scarce believe that he could carry them so far as to become guilty of treason to the King.”
Roger felt certain that his clever friend was now lying, and so, almost certainly, involved to some extent in the Orleanist plot himself. He therefore refrained from pressing the point and asked:
“Do you perchance know Monsieur de St. Huruge?”
“Not intimately. He frequents the royal circle, I believe, and for a long time past I have not been persona grata at Court. But why do you ask?”
“Because I was given a letter of introduction to him before I left England,” Roger lied; “and I have so far failed to discover his present address.”
“You might try the Palais Royal,” suggested de Périgord. “I do not go there often these days, but it chanced that I was there last week, and as I was on my way in to His Highness’s cabinet I passed de St. Huruge on his way out. Possibly one of the secretaries may be able to tell you where he lives.”
The fact that the villainous de Roubec’s sponsor had been seen coming from an interview with the Duc d’Orléans in his Paris home was no proof that he was necessarily an Orleanist himself; but it certainly lent considerable support to Roger’s theory that he might be. And in view of de Périgord’s evident reluctance to discuss d’Orléans he felt that he had been lucky to pick up this little piece of information. Having thanked the Bishop for his suggestion, he added:
“However, since I should still have to enquire of his whereabouts from a third party, I fear I shall not have time to find and wait upon him; as I am leaving Paris quite shortly.”
“Indeed!” De Périgord raised his eyebrows. “I am most sorry to hear it. You have been absent from Paris for so long; I was particularly looking forward to the renewed enjoyment of your society.”
As Roger bowed his acknowledgment of the graceful compliment, the Bishop went on: “Really; you should at least remain to witness the opening of the States. It will be vastly interesting; and I should be happy to introduce you to all the deputies of my acquaintance.”
“I thank Your Grace for your kindness, and most tempting offer.” Roger’s voice held genuine regret. “But, alas, I must decline it. Her Majesty’s disapproval of duelling did not manifest itself in my case only by her causing me to spend a night in the Bastille. When I was released this morning the Governor informed me of her further order, that within forty-eight hours I was to leave Paris.”
“What childish tyranny!” exlaimed the Bishop with some petulance. “Whither are you going?”
“To Provence. I have never seen your great cities there or the Mediterranean; and I am told that the coast in those regions is particularly lovely at this time of year.”
De Périgord took snuff again. “You are no doubt wise to keep out of the way for the next few weeks. But I should not let any fear of that order deter you from returning by June if you wish to do so. The royal authority has already become so weakened that it has almost ceased to count. And once the States have been sitting for a little the Court will be plaguey careful not to irritate them unnecessarily by forcing the observance of such arbitrary commands.”
“You feel confident, then, that the States will still be sitting; and that the King will not dismiss them after a few abortive sessions, as he did the Assembly of Notables?”
“He dare not, if he wishes to keep his crown.” A sudden note of hauteur had crept into the Bishop’s deep voice. “At present the King is still respected by the whole nation, and even beloved by the greater part of it. But the States will represent the very blood, brains, bone and muscle of France; and if he attempted to dismiss them he would become the enemy of the whole kingdom overnight. By his decision to call the States he has delivered himself bound into the hands of his subjects; for once they are assembled they will never dissolve except by their own will. I am positive of that.”