said heartlessly. ‘But I don’t run the nation into debt because of it.’
The Debt, the Deficit – these were the words on the lips of the café’s customers as they occupied themselves in trying to name a figure. Only a few people had the ability to imagine money on this scale, the café believed; they thought it was a special ability, and that M. Calonne, now the Comptroller-General, had not got it. M. Calonne was a perfect courtier, with his lace cuffs and lavender-water, his gold-topped cane and his well-attested greed for Perigord truffles. Like M. Necker, he was borrowing; the café thought that M. Necker’s borrowing had been considered, but that M. Calonne’s borrowing stemmed from a failure of imagination and a desire to keep up appearances.
In August 1786 the Comptroller-General presented to the King a package of proposed reforms. There was one weighty and pressing reason for action: one half of the next year’s revenues had already been spent. France was a rich country, M. Calonne told its sovereign; it could produce many times more revenue than at present. And could this fail to add to the glory and prestige of the monarchy? Louis seemed dubious. The glory and prestige were all very well, most agreeable, but he was anxious to do only what was right; and to produce this revenue would require substantial changes, would it not?
Indeed, his minister told him, from now on everybody – nobles, clergy, commons – must pay a land tax. The pernicious system of tax exemptions must be ended. There must be free trade, the internal customs dues must be abolished. And there must be some concessions to liberal opinion – the corvée must be done away with completely. The King frowned. He seemed to have been through all this before. It reminded him of M. Necker, he said. If he had thought, it would have reminded him of M. Turgot, but by now he was getting muddled.
The point is, he told his minister, that though he personally might favour such measures, the Parlements would never agree.
That, said M. Calonne, was a most cogent piece of reasoning. With his usual unerring accuracy, His Majesty had pinpointed the problem.
But if His Majesty felt these measures were necessary, should he allow himself to be baulked by the Parlements? Why not seize the initiative?
Mm, the King said. He moved restlessly in his chair, and looked out of the window to see what the weather was doing.
What he should do, Calonne said, was to call an Assembly of Notables. A what? said the King. Calonne pressed on. The Notables would at once be seized by a realization of the country’s economic plight, and throw their weight behind any measures the King deemed necessary. It would be a bold stroke, he assured the King, to create a body that was inherently superior to the Parlements, a body whose lead they would have to follow. It was the sort of thing, he said, that Henri IV would have done.
The King pondered. Henri IV was the most wise and popular of monarchs, and the very one that he, Louis, most desired to emulate.
The King put his head in his hands. It sounded a good idea, the way Calonne put it, but all his ministers were smooth talkers, and it was never quite as simple as they made out. Besides, the Queen and her set…He looked up. The Queen believed, he said, that the next time the Parlements got in his way they should simply be disbanded. The Parlements of Paris, all the provincial Parlements – chop, chop, went the King. All gone.
M. Calonne quaked when he heard this reasoning. What did it offer but a vista of acrimonious dealings, a decade of wrangling, of vendettas, of riots? We have to break out of this cycle, Your Majesty, he said. Believe me – please, you must believe me – things have never been this bad before.
GEORGES-JACQUES came to M. Charpentier, and he put his cards on the table. ‘I have a bastard,’ he said. ‘A son, four years old. I suppose I should have told you before.’
‘Why so?’ M. Charpentier gathered his wits. ‘Pleasant surprises should be saved up.’
‘I feel a hypocrite,’ d’Anton said. ‘I was just lecturing that little Camille.’
‘Do go on, Georges-Jacques. You have me riveted.’
They’d met on the coach, he said, on his first journey to Paris. She’d given him her address, he’d called on her a few days later. Things had gone on from there – well, M. Charpentier could imagine, perhaps. No, he was no longer involved with her, it was over. The boy was in the country with a nurse.
‘You offered her marriage, of course?’
D’Anton nodded.
‘And why wouldn’t she marry you?’
‘I expect she took a dislike to my face.’
In his mind’s eye he could see Françoise raging round her bedroom, aghast that she was subject to the same laws as other women: when I marry I want it to be worth my while, I don’t want some clerk, some nobody, and you with your passions and your self-conceit running after other women before the month’s out. Even when the baby was kicking inside her, it had seemed to him a remote contingency, might happen, might not. Babies were stillborn, they died in the first few days; he did not hope for this to happen, but he knew that it might.
But the baby grew, and was born. ‘Father unknown’, she put on the birth certificate. Now Françoise had found the man she wanted to marry – one Maître Huet de Paisy, a King’s Councillor. Maître Huet was thinking of selling his position – he had something else in mind, d’Anton did not inquire what. He was offering to sell it to d’Anton.
‘What’s the asking price?’
D’Anton told him. Having received his second big shock of the afternoon, Charpentier said, ‘That’s simply not possible.’
‘Yes, I know it’s vastly inflated, but it represents my settlement for the child. Maître Huet will acknowledge paternity, it will all be done in the correct legal form and the matter will be behind me.’
‘Her family should have made her marry you. What kind of people can they be?’ He paused. ‘In one sense the matter will be behind you, but what about your debts? I’m not sure how you can raise that amount in the first place.’ He pulled a piece of paper towards him. ‘This is what I can let you have – let’s call it a loan for now, but when the marriage contract is signed I waive the debt.’ D’Anton inclined his head. ‘I must have Gabrielle well set up, she’s my only daughter, I mean to do right by her. Now, your family can come up with – what? All right, but that’s little enough.’ He jotted down the figures. ‘How can we cover the shortfall?’
‘Borrow it. Well, that’s what Calonne would say.’
‘I see no other solution.’
‘I’m afraid there is another part to this deal. You won’t like it. The thing is, Françoise has offered to lend me the money herself. She’s well-off. We haven’t gone into the details, but I don’t suppose the interest rate will be in my favour.’
‘That’s iniquitous. Good God, what a bitch! Wouldn’t you like to strangle her?’
D’Anton smiled. ‘Oh, yes.’
‘I suppose you are quite sure the boy’s yours?’
‘She wouldn’t have lied to me. She wouldn’t dare.’
‘Men like to think that…’ He looked at d’Anton’s face. No, that was not the way out. So be it – the child was his. ‘It is a very
