of goddesses, horses, men: woollen arms, woollen hooves, draperies exuding the scent of camphor and damp. The topic was the thrill of the chase; he saw hounds and spaniels with dripping jaws, dough-faced huntsmen in costumes antique: a cornered stag foundered in a stream. He stopped suddenly, gripped by panic, by an impulse to cut and run. One of his escorts took him – quite gently – by the arm and steered him on.
Laclos waited for him in a little room with walls of green silk. ‘Sit down,’ he said. ‘Tell me about yourself. Tell me what was going through your mind when you got up there today.’ Self-contained, constrained, he could not imagine how anyone could parade his raw nerves to such effect.
The Duke’s friend de Sillery drifted in, and gave Camille some champagne. There was no gaming tonight, and he was bored: may as well talk to this extraordinary little agitator. ‘I suppose you have financial worries,’ Laclos said. ‘We could relieve you of those.’
When he had finished his questions he made an imperceptible signal, and the two silent gentlemen reappeared, and the process was reversed: the chill of marble underfoot, the murmur of voices behind closed doors, the sudden swell of laughter and music from unseen rooms. The tapestries had, he saw, borders of lilies, roses, blue pears. Outside the air was no cooler. A footman held up a flambeau. The carriage was back at the door.
Camille let his head drop back against the cushions. One of his escorts drew a velvet curtain, to shield their faces from the streets, Laclos declined supper and returned to his paperwork. The Duke is well-served by crowd-pleasers, he said, by unbalanced brats like that.
ON THE EVENING of 22 April, a Wednesday, Gabrielle’s year-old son refused his food, pushed the spoon away, lay whimpering and listless in his crib. She took him into her own bed, and he slept; but at dawn, she felt his forehead against her cheek, burning and dry.
Catherine ran for Dr Souberbielle. ‘Coughing?’ said the doctor. ‘Still not eaten? Well, don’t fuss. I don’t call this a healthy time of year.’ He patted her hand. ‘Try to get some rest yourself, my dear.’
By evening there was no improvement. Gabrielle slept for an hour or two, then came to relieve Catherine. She wedged herself into an upright chair, listening to the baby’s breathing. She could not stop herself touching him every few minutes – just a fingertip on cheek, a little pat to the sore chest.
By four o’clock he seemed better. His temperature had dropped, his fists unclenched, his eyelids drooped into a doze. She leaned back, relieved, her limbs turned to jelly with fatigue.
The next thing she heard was the clock striking five. Wrenched out of a dream, she jerked in her chair, almost fell. She stood up, sick and cold, steadying herself with a hand on the crib. She leaned over it. The baby lay belly-down, quite still. She knew without touching him that he was dead.
AT THE CROSSROADS of the rue Montreuil and the Faubourg Saint-Antoine there was a great house known to the people who lived there as Titonville. On the first floor were the (allegedly sumptuous) apartments occupied by one M. Réveillon. Below ground were vast cellars, where notable vintages appreciated in the dusk. On the ground floor was the source of M. Réveillon’s wealth – a wallpaper factory employing 350 people.
M. Réveillon had acquired Titonville after its original owner went bankrupt; he had built up a flourishing export trade. He was a rich man, and one of the largest employers in Paris, and it was natural that he should stand for the Estates-General. On 24 April he went with high hopes to the election meeting of the Sainte-Marguerite division, where his neighbours listened to him with deference. Good man, Réveillon. Knows his stuff.
M. Réveillon remarked that the price of bread was too high. There was a murmur of agreement and a little sycophantic applause: as if the observation were original. If the price of bread were to come down, M. Réveillon said, employers could cut wages; this would lead to a reduction in the price of manufactured articles. Otherwise, M. Réveillon said, where would it all end? Prices up, wages up, prices up, wages up…
M. Hanriot, who owned the saltpetre works, warmly seconded these observations. People lounged near the door, and handed out scraps of news to the unenfranchised, who stood outside in the gutter.
Only one part of M. Réveillon’s programme caught the public attention – his proposal to cut wages. Saint-Antoine came out on the streets.
De Crosne, the Lieutenant of Police, had already warned that there could be trouble in the district. It was teeming with migrant workers, unemployment was high, it was cramped, talkative, inflammable. News spread slowly across the city; but Saint-Marcel heard, and a group of demonstrators began a march towards the river. A drummer at their head set the pace, and they shouted for death:
Death to the rich
Death to the aristocrats
Death to the hoarders
Death to the priests.
They were carrying a gibbet knocked together in five minutes by a carpenter’s apprentice anxious to oblige: dangling from it were two eyeless straw dolls with their straw limbs pushed into old clothes and their names, Hanriot and Réveillon, chalked on their chests. Shopkeepers put up their shutters when they heard them coming. The dolls were executed with full ceremony in the Place de Grève.
All this is not so unusual. So far, the demonstrators have not even killed a cat. The mock executions are a ritual, they diffuse anger. The colonel of the French Guards sent fifty men to stand about near Titonville, in case anger was not quite diffused. But he neglected Hanriot’s house, and it was a simple matter for a group of the marchers to wheel up the rue Cotte, batter the doors down and start a fire. M. Hanriot got out unharmed. There were no casualties. M. Réveillon was elected a deputy.
But by Monday, the situation looked more serious. There were fresh crowds on the rue Saint-Antoine, and another incursion from Saint-Marcel. As the demonstrators marched along the embankments stevedores fell in with them, and the workers on the woodpiles, and the down-and-outs who slept under the bridges; the workers at the royal glass factory downed tools and came streaming out into the streets. Another two hundred French Guards were dispatched; they fell back in front of Titonville, commandeered carts and barricaded themselves in. It was at this point that their officers felt the stirrings of panic. There could be five thousand people beyond the barricades, or there could be ten thousand; there was no way of telling. There had been some sharp action these last few months; but this was different.
As it happened, that day there was a race-meeting at Vincennes. As the fashionable carriages crossed the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, nervous ladies and gentlemen dressed à l’Anglais were haled out on to the sewage and cobblestones. They were required to shout, ‘Down with the profiteers,’ then roughly assisted back into their seats. Many of the gentlemen parted with sums of money to ensure good will, and some of the ladies had to kiss lousy apprentices and stinking draymen, as a sign of solidarity. When the carriage of the Duke of Orléans appeared, there was cheering. The Duke got out, said a few soothing words, and emptied his purse among the crowd. The carriages behind were forced to halt. ‘The Duke is reviewing his troops,’ said one high, carrying aristocratic voice.
The guardsmen loaded their guns and waited. The crowd milled about, sometimes approaching the carts to talk to the soldiers, but showing no inclination to attack the barricades. Out at Vincennes the Anglophiles urged their favourites past the post. The afternoon went by.
Some attempt was made to divert the returning race-goers, but when the carriage of the Duchess of Orléans appeared the situation became difficult. Up there was where she wanted to go, the Duchess’s coachman said: past those barricades. The problem was explained. The reticent
