Page:A Book of Escapes and Hurried Journeys.pdf/23

in swift stages. They were prisoners in the strictest sense, for they had been forbidden even the customary Easter visit to St. Cloud. The puzzled, indolent king was no better than a cork tossed upon yeasty waters. Mirabeau was dead—Mirabeau who might have saved the monarchy; now the only hope was to save the royal family, for the shades were growing very dark around it. Marie Antoinette, the Queen, who, as Mirabeau had said, was "the only man the King had about him," had resolved to make a dash for freedom. She would leave Paris, even France, and seek her friends beyond the borders. The National Militia and the National Guards were for the Revolution; but the army of Bouillé on the eastern frontier, composed largely of German mercenaries, would do its general's orders, and Bouillé was staunch for the crown. Count Fersen had organized the plan, and the young Duke de Choiseul, a nephew of the minister of Louis XV., had come to Paris to settle the details. A coach had been built for the journey, a huge erection of leather and wood, of the type then called a berline, painted yellow, upholstered in white velvet, and drawn by no less than eleven horses. It was even now standing outside the eastern gate, and Fersen was waiting with his hackney carriage to conduct the royal fugitives thither.