CHAPTER V

Unrecorded stories concerning the assassination of the Duc de Berry

The assassination of the Duc de Berry hastened the down-fall of M. Decazes. A singular anecdote was circulated at the time. I took it down in writing at the house of my lawyer, who was a collector of historical documents. As well as I can remember, it was as follows. Three days before the Duc de Berry's assassination, King Louis XVIII. received a letter couched in these words:--

"SIRE,--Will your Majesty condescend to receive a person at eight o'clock to-morrow night, who has important revelations to make specially affecting your Majesty's family?

"If your Majesty deigns to receive this person, let a messenger be sent at once to find a chip of Oriental alabaster, which rests on the tomb of Cardinal Caprara, at Ste. Geneviève.

"In addition to this, your Majesty must obtain, by means of some other agent, a loose sheet of paper, out of a volume of the works of St. Augustine [here the exact designation was given], the use of which will be indicated later by the writer of this letter.

"Under penalty of not obtaining any result from the promised revelations, you must not begin by sending to the Library, nor by sending at the same time to the Library and to Ste. Geneviève. The safety of the person who desires to offer good advice to His Majesty depends upon the execution of the two prescribed acts in their given order."

The letter was unsigned. The mysterious bearing of this letter attracted the attention of Louis XVIII., and he sent for M. Decazes at seven o'clock on the following morning. Please be careful to note that I am not relating a historical fact, but an anecdote from memory, which I copied something like thirty years ago. Only later and in quite different circumstances of my life, it recurred to my mind as does effaced writing under the application of a chemical preparation.

So, as indicated above, Louis XVIII. sent next morning for M. Decazes.

"Monsieur," he said, as soon as he saw him, "you must go to the church of Ste. Geneviève; you must descend to the crypt, where you will find the tomb of Cardinal Caprara, and you must bring away the thing, no matter what it is, that you will find on the tomb."

M. Decazes went, and when he reached Ste. Geneviève, he went down to the crypt. There, to his great surprise, he found nothing on the tomb of Cardinal Caprara but a fragment of Oriental alabaster. However, his orders were precise: we might rather say they were positive. After a moment's hesitation, he picked up the bit of alabaster and took it back to the Tuileries. He expected the king to jeer at the servile obedience that brought him only an object so worthless, but quite the reverse was the case, for at the sight of the bit of alabaster the king trembled. Then, taking it in his hand and examining it minutely, he placed it on his desk.

"Now," said Louis XVIII., "send a trusted messenger to the Royal Library; he must ask for the works of St. Augustine, the 1669 edition, and in volume 7, between pages 404 and 405, he will find a sheet of paper."

"But, sire," asked M. Decazes, "why should not I myself go rather than entrust this commission to another?"

"Out of the question, _mon enfant_!" "_Mon enfant_" was the pet name by which the king called his favourite minister.

A trusted messenger was sent to the Royal Library: he opened St. Augustine at the given pages and found the paper described. It was a simple matter to take it away. The paper was a very thin, blank folio sheet oddly snipped here and there. While Louis XVIII. was searching for the mysterious revelations hidden in the jagged paper the secretary brought him a missive containing a leaf of the same size as that from the St. Augustine, but inscribed with apparently unintelligible letters. At the corner of the envelope in which this leaf came were written the two words: "Most urgent." The king understood that there was a connection between the two events and a likeness between the two leaves. He placed the cut sheet of paper over the written sheet and saw that the letters shown up through the holes in the upper leaf made sense. He dismissed the secretary and intimated to M. Decazes to leave him alone, and when both had gone, he made out the following lines:--

"King, thou art betrayed! Betrayed by thy minister and by the P.P. of thy S----.

"King, I alone can save thee. MARIANI."

The reader will understand that I do not hold myself responsible for this note any more than for the rest of the anecdote. The king did not mention this note to anyone; but, that evening, the Minister of the Police,[1] who was dismissed next day, issued orders to find a man named Mariani.

The following day, which was Sunday the 13th of February, the king on opening his prayer-book at mass found this note inside:--

"They have found out what I wrote; they are hunting for me. Do your utmost to see me, if you would avoid great misfortunes for your house. I shall know if you will receive me, by means of three wafers which you should stick inside the panes of your bedroom windows."

Although the king was greatly interested by this last letter of advice, he did not think it sufficiently urgent to attend to it as directed. He waited and hesitated, and then left matters till the morrow. That evening there was a special performance at the Opera, when _Le Rossignol_, _les Noces de Gamache_, and _le Carnaval de Venise_ were played. The Duc and Duchesse de Berry were present. About eleven o'clock, at the close of the second act of the ballet, the duchess, feeling tired, told her husband that she wished to leave. The prince would not allow her to go alone, but himself conducted her out of the Opera House. When he reached their carriage, which stood in the rue Rameau, just as he was helping the princess up the step, and saying to her, "Wait for me, I will rejoin you in a moment," a man darted forward rapidly, passed like a flash of lightning between the sentinel on guard at the door of exit and M. de Clermont-Lodève, the gentleman-in-waiting, seized the prince by the left shoulder, leant heavily against his breast and plunged a thin, sharp small-sword, with a boxwood hilt, in his right breast. The man left the weapon in the wound, knocked three or four curious bystanders spinning and disappeared immediately round the corner of the rue de Richelieu and under the Colbert Arcade. For the moment nobody noticed that the prince was wounded; he himself had hardly felt any pain beyond the blow of a fist.

"Take care where you are going, you clumsy fellow!" M. de Choiseul, the prince's aide-de-camp, had exclaimed, pushing the assassin to one side, thinking he was simply an unduly inquisitive bystander. Suddenly the prince lost his breath, grew pale and tottered, crying out, as he put his hand to his breast--

"I have been assassinated!"

"Impossible!" exclaimed those about him.

"See," replied the prince, "here is the dagger." And giving effect to his words, he drew out and held up the bloodstained sword from his breast. The carriage door had not yet been shut. The duchess sprang out, trying to catch her husband in her arms; but the prince was already past standing, even with this support. He fell gently back into the arms of those surrounding him, and was carried into the drawing-room belonging to the king's box. There he received immediate attention.

By the mere appearance of the wound, the shape of the dagger and the length of its blade, the doctors recognised the serious nature of the case, and declared that the prince must not be taken to the Tuileries. They therefore carried him to the suite of rooms occupied by M. de Grandsire, the Secretary to the Opera Company, who lived at the theatre. By a singular coincidence, the bed on which the dying prince was laid was the same on which he had slept the first night of his joyful re-entry into France. M. de Grandsire was at that time at Cherbourg and he had lent this very bed to put in the Duc de Berry's room. Here the prince learnt the arrest of his murderer. He asked his name. They told him it was Louis-Pierre Louvel. He seemed to search his memory and then, as if speaking to himself, he said, "I cannot recollect ever having injured this man."

No, prince, no, you did nothing to him; but you bear on your forehead the fatal seal which carries the Bourbons to the grave or into exile. No, prince, you have not injured the man, but you are heir to the throne and that is sufficient in this country for the hand of God to be laid heavily upon you. Look back, prince, on what has happened to those who, for the last sixty years, have handled the fatal crown to which they aspired. Louis XVI. died on the scaffold. Napoleon died at St. Helena. The Duc de Reichstadt died at Schoenbrünn. Charles X. died at Frohsdorf. Louis-Philippe died at Claremont. And who knows, prince, where your son, the Count de Chambord, will die? Where your cousin the Count de Paris? I ask the question of you who are about to know the secret of that eternal life which hides away from us all the mysteries of life and of death. And we would further point out to you, prince, that not one of your race will die in the Tuileries, or will rest as kings in the tombs of their fathers.

But it was a good and noble heart that was about to cease to beat amidst all the distracting events of that period. And when Louis XVIII., who had been informed of the assassination, came at six in the morning, to receive his nephew's last wishes, the first words of the wounded prince were--

"Sire, pardon the man!"

Louis XVIII. neither promised nor refused to pardon.

"My dear nephew, you will survive this cruel act, I trust," he replied, "and we will then discuss the matter again. It is of grave import, moreover," he added, "and it must be looked into most carefully at some future time."

These words had scarcely been uttered by the king when the prince began to fight for his breath; he stretched out his arms and asked to be turned on his left side.

"I am dying!" he said, as they hastened to carry out his last wish.

And, indeed, they had hardly moved him when, at the stroke of half-past six, he died.

The grief of the duchess was inexpressible. She seized scissors from the mantelpiece, let down her beautiful fair hair, cut it off to the roots and threw the locks on the dead body of her husband.

The sorrow of King Louis was twofold: not knowing that the Duchesse de Berry was pregnant, he deplored even more than the death of a murdered nephew the extinction of a race.

When he withdrew to the Tuileries, he remembered the events of the two preceding days--the letter received on the very morning of the assassination, the warning of some great calamity threatening the royal family. Then, although there was nothing more to be expected from the mysterious stranger, the legend that we have given goes on to say that Louis XVIII. dragged his aching limbs to the window and stuck the three wafers on its panes as a signal of welcome to the unknown writer of the letters. Two hours later, the king received a letter wrapped in three coverings:--

"It is too late! Let a confidential person come and meet me on the pont des Arts, where I will be at eleven o'clock to-night.

"I rely on the honour of the king."

At a quarter-past eleven the mysterious stranger was introduced into the Tuileries and conducted to the king's private chamber. He remained with Louis till one o'clock in the morning. No one ever knew what passed in that interview. The next day, M. Clausel de Coussergues proposed, in the Upper House, to impeach M. Decazes as an accomplice in the assassination of the Duc de Berry.

Thus, at the same time that the Napoleonic and Liberal party were disseminating the skits against the Bourbons which we have quoted, and distributing copies of the proceedings of the Maubreuil trial, the Extreme Right was attacking by similar means the Duc d'Orléans and M. Decazes; each in turn undermining and destroying one another, to the advantage of a fourth party, which was soon to make its appearance under the cloak of Carbonarism--we mean that Republican element which Napoleon, when he was dying in the island of St. Helena, prophesied would dominate the future.

But before tackling this question, one word more about Louvel. God forbid that we should glorify the assassin, no matter to what party he belonged! We would only indicate, from the historical point of view, the difference that may exist between one murderer and another. We have related how Louvel disappeared, first round the corner of the rue de Richelieu and then under the Colbert Arcade. He was just on the point of escaping when a carriage barred his course and compelled him to slacken his pace. During this moment of hesitation, the sentinel, who had thrown down his gun to pursue him and who had lost sight of him, had a glimpse of him again and redoubled his speed, caught up with him and seized him round the waist, a waiter from a neighbouring café; at the same time seizing hold of him by his collar. When he was captured, the assassin did not attempt any fresh effort. One would have thought that from motives of self-preservation he would have struggled to escape, but his one attempt at flight seemed to satisfy him, and had they let go their hold, he would not have taken his chance to regain liberty. Louvel was taken to the guard-house below the vestibule of the Opera.

"Wretch!" exclaimed M. de Clermont-Lodève, "what can have induced you to commit such a crime?"

"The desire to deliver France from one of its cruellest enemies."

"Who paid you to carry out the deed?"

"Paid me!" cried Louvel, tossing his head,--"paid me!" Then with a scornful smile he added, "Do you think one would do such a thing for money?"

Louvel's trial was carried to the Upper Chamber. On 5 June he appeared before the High Court. On the following day he was condemned to death. Four months had been spent in trying to find his accomplices, but not one had been discovered. He was taken back to the Conciergerie, an hour after his sentence had been pronounced, and one of his warders came to him.

"You would like," said the man to the prisoner, who throughout his trial had preserved the utmost calm and even the greatest decorum,--"you would like to send for a priest?" "What for?" asked Louvel.

"Why, to ease your conscience."

"Oh, my conscience is at ease: it tells me I did my duty."

"Your conscience deceives you. Listen to what I say and make your peace with God: that is my advice."

"And if I confess, do you suppose that will send me to Paradise?"

"May be: the mercy of God is infinite."

"Do you think the Prince de Condé, who has just died, will be in Paradise?"

"He should be, he was an upright prince."

"In that case, I would like to join him there; it would amuse me vastly to plague the old _émigré._"

The conversation was here interrupted by M. de Sémonville, who came to try and extract information from the prisoner. Finding he could not get anything from him, he said to Louvel--

"Is there anything you want?"

"Monsieur le comte," replied the condemned man, "I have had to sleep between such coarse sheets in prison, I would like some finer ones for my last night."

The request was granted. Louvel had his fine sheets and slept soundly between them from nine at night till six o'clock the next morning. On 6 June, at six in the evening, he was taken from the Conciergerie: it was the time of the famous troubles of which we shall speak presently. The streets were blocked, and there were spectators even on the roofs. He wore a round red cap and grey trousers, and a blue coat was fastened round his shoulders. The papers next day announced that his features were changed and his gait enfeebled.

Nothing of the kind: Louvel belonged to the family of assassins to which Ravaillac and Alibaud were akin--that is to say, he was a man of stout courage. He mounted the scaffold without bombast and also without any trace of weakness, and he died as men do who have sacrificed their lives to an idea.

His cell was the last in the Conciergerie, to the right, at the bottom of the corridor; it was the same in which Alibaud, Fieschi and Meunier had been kept.

[1] M. Decazes, Ministre de l'Intérieur, had charge of the police.