Виктория Холт - The Road to Compiegne

But if they thought that the King, in his interest in his grand-daughter-in-law, would forget Madame du Barry, they were mistaken.

Jeanne sat down with the royal party to supper at Muette, and the two women took stock of each other.

Jeanne laughed inwardly. Poof! she thought. Red-haired and sandy-skinned! Her eyelashes are so light you can scarcely see them. Why, if she were not the daughter of an Empress no one would take any notice of her.

The Dauphine had been schooled by her mother, so when the King asked her opinion of the Comtesse du Barry she was immediately aware of his desire for a favourable reply.

‘I find her both charming and amiable,’ said the Dauphine; and the King patted her hand and told her that he was certain he and she were going to be the best of friends.

The festivities which accompanied the marriage of the heir to the throne were naturally dazzling. The firework displays were magnificent and the road from Paris to Versailles was thick with the crowds on their way to see the sights. It was said that Louis was determined to imitate the splendour of his grandfather.

Ah, said the agitators, but times were different then. Now there was a shortage of grain in France. Why? It was blamed on bad harvests, but was it due to those who hoarded grain? Was the King guiltless?

Some began to calculate the cost of the festivities, and they were discovered to be somewhere in the neighbourhood of twenty million livres.

Twenty million livres, when there were thousands in the capital alone who could not afford to buy bread! Pamphlets were published. One, Reflections on the Nuptials of His Highness the Dauphin, circulated throughout Paris, gave an account of the cost of the entertainments which had been given to celebrate the marriage.

While the people waited to see the sights they grumbled together.

A banquet was given at the Hôtel de Ville, to be followed by a display of fireworks in the Place Louis XV, and during this display some scaffolding caught fire and this spread to nearby buildings. Panic ensued and in their endeavours to escape many people were trampled underfoot. Eight hundred people were injured on that night, two hundred of them fatally.

It was a grim scene when daylight disclosed what had occurred on that tragic spot, stained with the blood of the dead and injured. People stood about in groups talking of the disaster. They grumbled about such lavish displays; they talked of the price of bread and the extravagance of these wedding celebrations.

Why should the people starve when the aristocrats lived in luxury? That was the question which was being asked on that very spot which in the near future was to be renamed the Place de la Révolution.

There was now a powerful party to stand against Choiseul, and at its very heart was Madame du Barry. Jeanne listened to what they told her she must do; Richelieu, Aiguillon, Maupéou, the Abbé Terray were all advising her. ‘Persuade the King to this . . . to that.’

The King listened to her, for Louis at sixty was beginning to long more and more for peace; and Jean Baptiste and his sister Chon were continually warning Madame du Barry that either Choiseul must go or she would.

Thus it was that the odds were growing against Choiseul.

The Duc, otherwise so shrewd, entrenched himself in his nobility and refused to believe that a fille de rien could ever be important to the crown of France. Madame de Pompadour was at least bourgeoise; she was a woman of education to compare with that of members of the Court; therefore he had quickly realised that it was wiser to be on her side than against her; but he refused to consider Madame du Barry worthy of his attention.

Choiseul was now being blamed for the failure of the Seven Years War – most unfairly, for the war had been a disaster before he had come to power. It was remembered that he had spent thirty million livres in an endeavour to establish a settlement in Guiana, for which purpose he had sent out twelve thousand people from Alsace and Lorraine. Almost every one of those would-be-colonists had died.

‘Why,’ asked the Barriens, ‘should this man Choiseul be regarded as a great statesman, essential to France? Look at his record.’

It was true that he had annexed Corsica, but to do this he had used an immense amount of public funds, which must come from the poverty-stricken people. They forgot too how he had strengthened the Army and Navy.

As Madame du Barry became more important to the King, so the disgrace of Choiseul became more certain.

* * *

Meanwhile Aiguillon had become involved with the magistrates of Rennes by his arrest of La Chalotais, the Attorney-General who had worked against the Jesuits and had been scornful of the weak manner in which Breton affairs were conducted.

It was a sign of the times that every French province had now begun to ask what was happening to the liberty of the people; and when the Duc d’Aiguillon sought to force obedience from the Breton Parlement, the Parlement of Paris rose in support of its Breton counterpart.

Louis was finding himself drawn into conflict with his Parlements.

It was when La Chalotais wrote a letter of complaint against Aiguillon to the King that Aiguillon ordered the arrest of Chalotais. The Parlement then brought a counter-charge against Aiguillon accusing him of embezzling public monies; and with this charge against him, and because the Parlement refused to try La Chalotais, Aiguillon came to Paris to ask for vindication there.

Louis presided at his trial, for which members of the Parlement came to Versailles.

The King however was eager to escape from the restraint put upon the monarchy by the Parlement, and after two sittings he destroyed the documents involving Aiguillon and declared the Duc immune from further accusations.

The Parlement left Versailles and in Paris made a declaration that in spite of the King Aiguillon should be ‘deprived of his rights and privileges as a peer until he should be purged of the suspicions which stained his honour’.

This was a direct insult to Louis, a reminder that Parlement was now more powerful than the monarchy. There could be nothing more likely to inflame the wrath of one who had always believed in the Divine Right of Kings.

As Choiseul must take his stand on the side of the Parlement, the Barriens saw a means of ridding themselves of the Minister and his friends and slipping into power themselves.

The Chancellor Maupéou placed himself on the side of the King, in spite of the fact that he had been given his post by Choiseul; but he believed that only with the dismissal of Choiseul could he achieve the power he sought. Therefore, although until this moment he had feigned loyalty to Choiseul, now that Choiseul appeared to be in decline he no longer felt the need to do so.

Maupéou had joined the Barriens, and the party discussed its policy which should receive the support of the King through Madame du Barry.

* * *

In the streets of Paris the struggle between King and Parlement was growing. There was change in the air. Louis had been hated for so long that few remembered those days when he had been known as Le Bien-Aimé.

The songsters and rhymesters were busy. There was a new prayer ironically shouted in the cafés:

‘Our Father, who art at Versailles, honoured be thy name; thy Kingdom is undone; thy will is as little done on Earth as it is in Heaven; give us back our daily bread which thou hast taken away. Forgive thy Parliaments, who have supported thy interests, as thou forgivest thy ministers who have sold them. Be not led into temptation by the du Barry, but deliver us from the demon Chancellor. Amen.’

All Paris was agog to see the magnificent carriage which the Duc d’Aiguillon had presented to Madame du Barry, presumably as an acknowledgement for the King’s support in his recent trial.

The arms of the du Barrys were set in the centre of four gold panels, and two doves, representing the King and his mistress, were depicted nestling in a bed of roses.

All agreed that there could never have been such a luxurious carriage; beside it those of the Dauphine looked cheap.

The cost of the magnificent vehicle was discovered to be somewhere in the neighbourhood of fifty-two thousand livres.

‘Fifty-two thousand livres on a carriage!’ said the people. ‘When we cannot afford to pay two sous for bread!’

* * *

Choiseul could now clearly see disaster looming ahead, and he believed that nothing but war could save him from dismissal, because then he would be indispensable to his country.

He commenced secret negotiations with Spain hoping that that country would provoke England into war over a dispute which had sprung up between the two countries concerning the Falkland Islands. But with the recent example of how disastrous war could be, the Spanish were in no mood to precipitate themselves into hostilities merely to save Choiseul, and they hesitated.

Choiseul was cornered. He had no alternative but to disclose his intentions, and he was immediately accused by the Abbé Terray, Aiguillon and Maupéou of trying to provoke war.

Choiseul fought desperately for his position. He sought an interview with the King, during which he assured him that if he would exile Maupéou and Terray the Parlement would cease to make trouble. On the other hand the Chancellor, the Abbé and Aiguillon told the King that the only way to avoid trouble was to dismiss Choiseul.