Madame Tussaud: A Novel of the French Revolution (43 page)

“The National Assembly means to take my brother’s power and leave him with nothing more than a veto. Why not just strip him of everything right now?” she asks. “Because, in the end, that’s what they plan to do.”

We are in the workshop with de Bombelles, who must no longer be referred to as the marquise. At every door, along every hall, the National Guardsmen who have been posted to the Tuileries have found a hundred ways of making life miserable for the royal family. They whisper threats under their breath as the family dines. They warn the innocent and impressionable dauphin to be careful in the gardens, because assassins might be waiting behind every bush. They leave behind crude drawings for Madame Royale to find, and they threaten anyone who mistakenly addresses them with a hereditary title.

“It’s become unbearable,” de Bombelles agrees, taking from me a pair of glass eyes. “And now they’ve forbidden the royal family to leave. Élisabeth can no longer go out to deliver her saints.”

I look up in surprise. “Not even to a church?”

Madame Élisabeth shakes her head. “We are prisoners in here,” she says, repeating something she told me two years ago. “I predicted this, and my brother wouldn’t believe me.”

“We will find someone to deliver your models,” I promise. She has completed thirty-three to date. Now we are working on a figure of Saint Stephen, who was stoned to death for his visions of God. His head is crowned with thorns, and his upturned palms are filled with rocks.

“Now I know how it felt for Daniel, pacing the lions’ den with no chance of escape.”

“Except through God,” de Bombelles adds immediately.

“Yes.” Madame Élisabeth hesitates. “Except through God.”

On June seventeenth, when I return to her workshop, a new mood has settled over the Tuileries. From down the hall, I can hear the king whistling. Madame Élisabeth is insistent that we finish the model of Saint Stephen today, even though there’s no time to paint on his sandals.

“He’ll go barefoot,” she decides. “That’s not so terrible, is it?” I laugh. “No, Madame.”

“So tell me,” she says, and her voice is full of intrigue and hope. “The queen says that there are shops now that sell ready-made clothing at the Palais-Royal. Is it true?”

“Yes. You can walk in and purchase a dress without hiring a tailor or having to be fitted.”

“Imagine!” She looks at de Bombelles. “A world without tailors.”

De Bombelles wrinkles her nose. She wants to say,
A world run by commoners
.

“And what do they charge?” Madame Élisabeth asks.

“They have a list,” I tell her. “Fancy chemise gowns trimmed with pearls are more expensive than plain ones, and the same goes for bonnets and fichus.”

“And the men? Are there shops for ready-made men’s clothing as well?”

“Yes. They can pick out wool jackets or choose
culottes
in three different sizes.”

This is something de Bombelles cannot conceive of. “And if someone is gigantically fat?” she demands. “What do they do?”

“Well, if they look like the Duc d’Orléans,” I whisper, “they continue to hire a tailor.”

Both women laugh uproariously. There’s no love between them and the Duc—or Philippe Égalité, as he wishes to be called, though I shall never think of him this way. Madame Élisabeth wipes tears from her eyes. “Things are truly changing,” she says. Her face becomes serious. “Thank you, Marie, for everything you’ve done for us.”

“It is nothing, Madame.”

“It is. And I want you to know I will never forget it.”

That evening, as I make my way down the hall, I recognize a woman’s voice on the stairs. Rose is talking to Léonard while half a dozen women trail behind them with baskets of accessories and heavy dresses. “Rose!” I exclaim.

Everyone freezes, as if they’ve been caught in a shameful act. “Go.” She motions for the others to continue, and when they’ve disappeared down the hall, she turns to me. “So you are helping them prepare as well?”

I frown. “Who?”

“The royal family,” she whispers impatiently. “Did they want something I couldn’t bring?” When I am silent, she realizes the mistake she has made. “Never mind,” she says quickly.

“Why? What are they planning?”

“Nothing.” Rose levels me with her gaze. “I never said anything.”

Chapter 39

J
UNE
21, 1791

It is with regret that I pronounce the fatal truth: Louis ought to perish rather than a hundred thousand virtuous citizens; Louis must die that the country may live
.

—M
AXIMILIEN
R
OBESPIERRE

O
N
J
UNE TWENTY-FIRST, JUST AFTER DAWN, WHILE MOST OF
the city is still asleep, a tocsin begins to ring. The sound starts as a single chime, then becomes a cacophony of bells as I hurry into a simple muslin dress. In the hall, my mother is covering her ears. We wait for Curtius to put on his boots, then we hurry downstairs and open the door. People are in the streets, shouting above the relentless ringing. Henri and Jacques are speaking with our grocer, and we join the three of them.

“The royal family has escaped,” Henri tells us. “They made away last night without anyone suspecting.”

“Everyone is gone!” The grocer is pulling at his apron. He has been a vocal supporter of this Revolution, and it will not go well for him if the tide turns. “The king, the queen, the children, and their governess. Madame Élisabeth is gone. Even the king’s brother the Comte de Provence has escaped. As well as his wife.”

My first feeling is of immense relief. Whatever happens now, it is in God’s hands. Then I think of what may happen if the king returns with Austrian troops. Wars do not discriminate in their destruction. With certainty, the entire city will be punished. The Palais-Royal, with its cafés and salons, will be the first to be destroyed. And who’s to say that foreign troops won’t look to the Boulevard after that?

“Curtius!” someone shouts. A small man is trying to make his way through the crowds, and when I glimpse a pair of green spectacles, I recognize Robespierre. When he reaches us, his voice is filled with emotion. “Curtius,” he says, and for a moment I wonder if he is going to embrace him. “This is the day when every patriot will be put to the test. There is no doubt about it now. Our lives are in danger. Every aristocrat in France is hoping to rise up and crush this Revolution. Tell me,” he begs, and his hands are shaking. “Is the National Guard with us?”

“Of course,” Curtius replies.

“Then come with me to the Manège. We must inspire the people to stand against this!”

There is no hope of taking a coach, so the six of us follow Robespierre through the streets. The bells have stopped ringing, but the roads are so crowded with panicked citizens that the forty-minute walk takes us more than two hours. When we finally reach the Salle du Manège at the edge of the Tuileries Gardens, thousands of people are crushing one another in a desperate attempt to get inside. It will be another half hour just to get through the masses.

“There’s another way,” Robespierre says. He leads us through a back door built for the royal equestrian academy. The hall was constructed to house horses, not people, and as we take our seats in the public gallery, I can imagine how Mirabeau must have suffered in here. The room is ten times as long as it is wide, with high vaulted windows that let in little air. Because it’s impossible to hear anything from the back, Robespierre finds us seats in the balcony. As an assemblyman, however, he does not sit with us. He takes Curtius with him to the benches below, where other members are listening and shaking their heads.

The mayor of Paris has taken the podium and is attempting to create calm by telling the Assembly that the king has not fled of his own accord. “He must have been kidnapped!” Mayor Bailly cries. “Look at the men who surround him, the ministers we’ve allowed to give him advice. Are they as trustworthy as our king, who has only the good of his people at heart?”

There are hisses from the crowd, and several assemblymen make threatening gestures. Then a tall man with dark hair strides forward, holding a fistful of papers in the air. I recognize him as Alexandre de Beauharnais, a nobleman who once came to the Salon looking to order a model of himself and his wife. He pushes aside the mayor and takes the podium. “Proof,” he shouts, “in the king’s own handwriting that he will never support a Constitution!”

Alexandre begins to read the damning evidence purposefully left behind in the Tuileries on the king’s desk. In the letter, the king complains about the creation of the Assembly and goes so far as to call for a counterrevolution in Paris. There is no doubt now about his intentions. Wherever the king has fled, there is going to be war. If he should reach Austria, he will summon his own troops and any the queen’s brother is willing to provide. Paris has two weeks, perhaps a month at most, before an army descends.

Robespierre takes the podium, but no one can hear him above the chaos. He gives up and appears on the balcony. “Come with me to the Jacobin Club,” he tells us. “There will be order there, and we can decide what to do.”

But inside the Club, there is pandemonium as well. When Robespierre is finally able to command silence, his speech is scathing.

“There are those in this audience who have perfected the mask of patriotism,” he says. “They wear the tricolor on their hats, yet they are royalists in their hearts. These are the enemies who are most dangerous to us. These are the men who will be your assassins as soon as the new flower of our liberty is plucked. Look around you!” he shouts. “Unless you wish to be crushed by the growing sea of tyranny about to descend, I suggest we find these false patriots and root them out!”

I look at my mother, whose face is as pale as mine must be. My brothers are in the Swiss Guard. Our first language is German.

“He trusts you,” Henri whispers. “It was Curtius he went to when the news came.”

“In twenty-four hours,” Robespierre continues, “if the king isn’t captured, we should all expect war. I have prepared myself for whatever is to come. I am willing to give my life for the liberty of my country.”

“And we would give our lives to save you!” someone shouts. It’s Camille, and he has brought Lucile with him. They are sitting together at the front of the room, both wearing enormous tricolor cockades. The Club members rise and swear to defend Robespierre’s life with their own. “Until the end!” they cry, and the shout is echoed throughout the old monastery.

As we leave the Club, Robespierre is on the verge of tears. “They love me,” he says. “They can see I serve my country even before myself.” He stops in front of a young sapling and gently reaches out to touch its leaves. It’s one of the many liberty trees planted by the revolutionaries in the past three months. Before the dinner to celebrate Camille’s marriage to Lucile, the guests gathered in the Tuileries Gardens to plant a liberty tree in their name. It’s the fashionable thing to do among patriots now.

“The National Guard will be ready to fight by this evening,” Curtius swears. “I’m going now to see Lafayette.”

“The king will return with more troops than you can fight,” Robespierre worries.

“That may be true, but we won’t be unprepared. Where are you going?”

“Home,” Robespierre says quietly, “to make my will.”

That evening, as Alexandre de Beauharnais assumes the leadership of France, we push through the crowds to the Boulevard du Temple, where we each make wills of our own.

“There has never been a better time to marry,” Henri says. The rest of the house has gone to sleep, and we are the only ones inside the salon.

“In a time of uncertainty?”

“In a time when we don’t know if we’ll be alive to see the end of this month or the next.”

“Tomorrow,” I say. “Let’s discuss this tomorrow.”

But he reaches across the couch and pulls me toward him. “I am tired of tomorrow, Marie.” His eyes are wide and full of conviction. “I love you now.”

Chapter 40

J
UNE
22, 1791