Without speaking a word, and with hasty steps, the royal couple, followed by the ministers and courtiers, traversed the two adjoining apartments, and entered the balcony-room, which, situated at the centre of the main building, commanded a wide view of the inner court and the square in front of it.
The valet Hue hastened, at a motion from the king, to throw open the great folding doors, and the king, parting with a smile from Marie Antoinette, stepped out upon the balcony. In an instant, as if the arm of God had been extended and laid upon this raging sea, the roaring ceased; then, as soon as the king was recognized, a multitudinous shout went up, increasing every moment, and sending its waves beyond the square, out into the adjoining streets.
"The king! Long live the king!"
Louis, pale with emotion and with tears in his eyes, went forward to the very edge of the balcony, and, as a sign that he was going to speak, raised both hands. The motion was understood, and the loud cries were hushed which now and then burst from the mighty mass of people. Then above the heads of the thousands there who gazed breathlessly up, sounded the loud, powerful voice of the king.
"I will give my dear people the proof that my fatherly heart is distrusted without reason. I will journey to-day with the queen and my children to Paris, and there take up my residence. Return thither, my children, I shall follow you in a few hours and come to Paris!"
Then, while the people were breaking out into a cry of joy, and were throwing arms, caps, and clothes up into the air, Louis stepped back from the balcony into the hall.
Instantly there arose a new cry below. "The queen shall show herself! We want to see the queen! The queen! the queen! the queen!"
And in tones louder, and more commanding, and more terrible every moment, the summons came in through the balcony door.
The queen took her two children by the hand and advanced a step or two, but the king held her back.
"Do not go, Marie," he cried, with trembling voice and anxious look.
"No, do not go. It is such a fearful sight, this raging mass at one's feet, it confuses one's senses. Do not go, Marie!"
But the cry below had now expanded into the volume of a hurricane, and made the very walls of the palace shake.
"You hear plainly, sire," cried Marie Antoinette; "there is just as much danger whether we see or do not see it. Let me do, therefore, what you have done! Come, children!"
And walking between the two little ones, the queen stepped out upon the balcony with a firm step and raised head, followed by the king, who placed himself behind Marie Antoinette, as if he were a sentinel charged with the duty of protecting her life.
But the appearance of the whole royal family did not produce the effect which Louis had, perhaps, anticipated. The crowd did not now break out into snouts of joy.
They cried and roared and howled: "The queen alone! No children! We want no one but the queen! Away with the children!"
It was all in vain that Louis advanced to the edge of the platform; in vain that he raised his arms as if commanding silence. The sound of his voice was lost in the roar of the mob, who, with their clinched fists, their pikes and other weapons, their horrid cry, so frightened the dauphin that he could not restrain his tears.
The royal family drew back and entered the apartment again, where they were received by the pale, trembling, speechless, weeping courtiers and servants.
But the mob below were not pacified. They appeared as though they were determined to give laws to the king and queen, and demand obedience from them.
"The queen! we will see the queen!" was the cry again and again.
"The queen shall show herself!"
"Well, be it so!" cried Marie Antoinette, with cool decision, and, pressing through the courtiers, who wanted to restrain her, and even impatiently thrusting back the king, who implored her not to go, she stepped out upon the balcony. Alone, without any one to accompany her, and having only the protection which the lion-tamer has when he enters the cage of the fierce monsters--the look of the eye and the commanding mien!
And the lion appeared to be subdued; his fearful roar suddenly ceased, and in astonishment all these thousands gazed up at the queen, the daughter of the Caesars, standing above in proud composure, her arms folded upon her breast, and looking down with steady eye into the yawning and raging abyss.
The people, overcome by this royal composure, broke into loud shouts of applause, and, during the continuance of these thousand-voiced bravos, the queen, with a proud smile upon her lips, stepped back from the balcony into the chamber.
The dauphin flew to her with open arms and climbed up her knee.
"Mamma queen, my dear mamma queen," cried he, "stay with me, don't go out again to these dreadful men, I am afraid of them--oh, I am afraid!"
Marie Antoinette took the little boy in her arms, and with her cold, pale lips pressed a kiss upon his forehead. For one instant it seemed as if she felt herself overcome by the fearful scene through which she had just passed--as if the tears which were confined in her heart would force themselves into her eyes. But Marie Antoinette overcame this weakness of the woman, for she felt that at this hour she could only be a queen.
With the dauphin in her arms, and pressing him closely to her heart, she advanced to the king, who, in order not to let his wife see the tears which flooded his face, had withdrawn to the adjoining apartment and was leaning against the door.
"Sire," said Marie Antoinette, entering the room, and presenting the dauphin to him, "sire, I conjure you that, in this fearful hour, you will make one promise to me."
"What is it, Marie?" asked the king, "what do you desire?"