On Sunday, when it’s time for me to go, the princesse stands on the porch in her heavy black gown and asks if her secretary has already paid me. “Yes,” I lie. I don’t tell her that I refused his money. That I’ve done nothing this week to entertain her.
“Perhaps you will come again for two days a week in July.” She dabs at her tears. “The month of June is finished for me.”
From my carriage, I look back at her, a dark blot against the warm June sun. I wave, and she raises her handkerchief to me, but her movements are pained and slow.
WHILE THE ROYAL family is in mourning, the nation’s affairs are moving on without them. Camille returns on Tuesday nights to meet with Lucile and tells us of what’s happening in the Salle des Etats. The Third Estate has refused all efforts to vote by order, and Robespierre has given a speech stating that if the nobility and clergy will not join them in voting by head, they will form their own assembly and vote without them.
“The Third Estate has p-p-power,” Camille exclaims, flush with excitement. “We will not vote until every voice is counted. If the nobility don’t wish to join us, we’ll leave them behind!”
On the seventeenth of June, this is exactly what happens. Curtius and I rush to change the signs in the Salon de Cire. Patrons crowd our windows, and the line to see the figures of Necker and Mirabeau stretches down the Boulevard. It is unbelievable. The Third Estate are now calling themselves the National Assembly. And their first act is to abolish all taxes levied by the crown! Henceforth, taxes shall be legal only if levied by the National Assembly. This is a blow that even the king cannot reinterpret in a harmless light. The newspapers report that the king plans to appear in the Salle des Etats to annul this new Assembly’s resolutions, while Necker is suggesting compromise.
Then, on the twentieth of June, the Third Estate is locked out of the Salle des Etats. Perhaps it’s a mistake. A miscommunication. But men like Robespierre and Danton insist that it’s a plot to break up the National Assembly. So they meet on a tennis court on the Rue du Vieux-Versailles. Some members of the clergy are there, and all of them swear to God and country that they will never be separated until a constitution is written for France. The newspapers are calling it the Tennis Court Oath.
Curtius rushes to print these words on a poster above Robespierre, and Yachin begins shouting in the streets, “Come see the deputies of the Tennis Court Oath. Come see the men who have challenged the king!”
Every day it is something new. Now the Third Estate are meeting in the Church of Saint-Louis, where I met with Rose Bertin. I sketch it for Curtius, and our Salle des Etats becomes a church.
On Sunday, Henri, Curtius, and I join those who are crowding into every cafe at the Palais-Royal to hear orators make speeches about the monarchy. It is where all the best news is to be had. But every cafe is full.
“We can try the Cafe de Foy,” Henri suggests.
There are only a few seats when we arrive, and it is almost impossible to place an order. But we sit and listen to what a man of nineteen or twenty has to say.
“Do you think it’s right that while we suffer without bread the queen powders her towering
The crowd inside the cafe jeers. “Or perhaps it’s to remind us that the queen sleeps on beds of rose petals and silk while we sleep on rotten hay! And what of the king? How can he hear our demands when he is sleeping through his Minister of Finance’s speech?”
There is a great deal of clapping and hollering over this. Henri asks me, “Did the king really fall asleep during Necker’s speech?”
“Yes. And he snored.”
My uncle laughs. “The queen didn’t elbow him in the ribs?”
“All of Versailles was watching.”
Henri shakes his head. “This wouldn’t be happening under Louis XV.”
“I would have to agree.” The broad figure of a woman obscures our view.
“Mademoiselle Bertin.” Henri rises.
“Oh, just Rose.” She smiles widely for him, and though I know I shouldn’t, I feel the sudden urge to keep her standing. But Henri gives up his chair and finds another for himself. “Thank you.” She flutters her lashes at him. They look longer than usual. Certainly they’re fake. “Monsieur Curtius. Marie.” She seats herself and orders a coffee. “So tell me. What have I missed?” She leans forward so that her breasts nearly tumble from her dress. It’s completely unnecessary. Where’s her fichu? But Henri doesn’t seem to notice.
“A lot of grumbling against the monarchy,” he replies. “And tomorrow, the royal family goes on parade.”
Rose dismisses this information with a wave of her hand. “Of course. I’ve already been asked to dress the queen.”
“And how are her spirits?” Curtius wonders. “First the dauphin, now this …”
“Devastated,” Rose confides. “She’s said to me that she’s no better than an actress, staging a performance for an audience that will hiss at her. But what can she do? She has encouraged the king to surround Paris with soldiers.” Rose’s eyes dart about the room, to see who might be listening, but the cafe is too noisy for anyone else to hear. “She thinks he must quell this rebellion with force.”
“If that happens—”
“Oh, it won’t,” Rose says. “The king can never make a decision. Louis”—
“Much like your boutique. When’s the last time the queen ordered so many dresses?”
Rose grins. “Perhaps the royal family should parade more often.”
BUT THE PROCESSION is not successful. The people line the roads from Paris to Versailles and watch their monarchs pass in stoic silence. I refuse to watch a woman crippled by the loss of her elder son forced to dress in her finest silks to convince people that the nation is more important than personal grief. And it is. But when is the queen allowed to weep, to face the misery of loss?
The fishwives taunted her for not producing a child after she arrived in France. And then, when the child came, they cheered in the streets and lit fireworks in the sky. Now, it’s as if Louis-Joseph, with his curious eyes and hopeful smile, never even was.
I can’t imagine the sorrow of the queen when she learns that forty-seven members of the nobility have already joined the National Assembly, following the lead of the Duc d’Orleans. We rush to re-dress his wax model in a black coat with a white cravat. Though it’s galling to me, the Duc’s figure dressed in plebeian clothes is an astounding draw. People pay twenty sous. Then twenty-five. There are so many visiting Englishmen that we send our signs to Yachin’s father to have them translated into English. As a printer, he can do these things. Although I cannot read the signs, I hang them in each room of the Salon.
It is all happening quickly now. Without daily trips into the Palais-Royal, it would be impossible to keep up with the news. On the twenty-third of June, the king visits the National Assembly against his Finance Minister’s wishes, and declares that the divisions between the three estates must remain. He orders the errant members of the clergy and nobility to return to their own assemblies. As Camille describes it for us that night in our salon, Necker is so outraged that he resigns his post.
“And then Mirabeau stood on his seat and declared to the entire Assembly, ‘We are here by the power of the people, and we will not leave except by the force of bayonets.’ Can you imagine?” Camille is nearly crying with joy. “He challenged the k-king!”
“And Necker?” Lucile asks.
“Oh, Necker returned to his post,” Camille says. “The king spent the afternoon begging.”
“So what will happen?” Henri asks.
“I don’t know!” Camille thrives off of this uncertainty. “I have to return to Versailles tomorrow. I have two articles I’m working on for the gazette.”
“And something else,” Lucile adds coyly. “Go ahead. Tell them.”
Camille looks around the table. We are a smaller group tonight: Robespierre and the Duc have not been here since finding fame in the Assembly. They have not even seen themselves in wax. “I am writing my first political tract,” he says.
