DENNIS WHEATLEY
THE MAN WHO KILLED THE KING
For my grand-daughter
ANTONIA
and my step-grand-children
CAROLINE, MAXINE, CHRISTOPHER
JULIAN AND JAMES
this story which, with its predecessor
THE RISING STORM,
will give them, when they are old enough, the
whole true picture of the French Revolution
in “history without tears”.
CONTENTS
Prologue
Introduction
Chapter I A Bishop Briefs a Spy
Chapter II The Lady in the Bath
Chapter III The Tempest Breaks
Chapter IV The Vortex of the Cyclone
Chapter V The Queen’s Ordeal
Chapter VI The Changing of a Heart
Chapter VII Toujours l’Audace
Chapter VIII A New Identity
Chapter IX The Great Conspiracy
Chapter X The Great Betrayal
Chapter XI In the Name of the Law
Chapter XII The Beginning of the Terror
Chapter XIII Paris Runs with Blood
Chapter XIV Citoyen Représentant en Mission
Chapter XV “I Vote for Death”
Chapter XVI Madame la Guillotine
Chapter XVII The “Questioning” of Athénaïs
Chapter XVIII A Grim Business
Chapter XIX The Good Assassin
Chapter XX The Oath
Chapter XXI The Price of Infidelity
Chapter XXII The Ante-chamber of Death
Chapter XXIII Barren Victory
Chapter XXIV Twice Hoist with His Own Petard
Chapter XXV Home, Sweet (?) Home
Chapter XXVI The Great Terror
Chapter XXVII Death to the Tyrant
Chapter XXVIII The Mystery of the Temple
Chapter XXIX Roger Brook versus the French Republic
Epilogue
A Note on the Author
PROLOGUE
“Madam! I would be better served did I live in a hostel.”
“Sir! I’ve not a doubt of it; but there you would have to pay your bills or they would throw you out!”
“Amanda!”
“Roger, I did not mean——”
A long shadow, falling across the entrance of the summerhouse in which husband and wife stood, caused her to break off. It was that of the “best man” at their wedding, the clever, eccentric Lord Edward Fitz-Deverel. He had driven out on this sunny Sunday early in June, 1792, to their home in Richmond Park. After an early dinner he had left them, in order to let his groom know the hour at which he proposed to start back for London, and he had rejoined them sooner than they expected. Now, both of them were wondering uneasily if he had overheard their undignified recriminations.
They had been married close on two years, and made a handsome couple. Roger Brook was slimly but strongly built, his good shoulders well set off by a blue cut-away coat that matched the colour of his eyes. Beneath it his double-breasted waistcoat was embroidered with a gay pattern of flowers, and his white twill breeches merged into stockings of the sheerest silk. His brown hair was combed back from a good forehead, and although his mouth had become a trifle hard from the many hazardous experiences of his youth, making him look considerably older than his twenty-four years, his thin face was full of liveliness and charm. Amanda, the same age, was tallish for a woman, with slightly frizzy auburn hair and the flawless skin that often accompanies it. The full skirts of her striped yellow and white taffeta frock accentuated the narrowness of her waist; above it a fichu of snowy lawn fell in graceful folds over her well-rounded breasts. Her lips, as nearly always, were slightly parted, showing a glimpse of fine white teeth, as though about to smile.
“Droopy Ned”, as Lord Edward had been nicknamed from his permanent stoop, regarded them in silence for a moment. The pale blue, shortsighted eyes that smiled at them above his beaky nose told them nothing. He was a fop of the first order, and his manners matched his exquisite apparel. After flourishing his lace handkerchief above his heart in a bow to Amanda, he turned to Roger with a lazy shrug, and drawled:
“The dratted fellow must have punished your good ale so heavily that he has gone to sleep it off in a hay-loft, for I failed to find so much as a smell of him.”
“I’ll go and find him for you,” Roger volunteered, glad of the excuse to break up an awkward situation. “I expect my man, Dan, has taken him up to his cottage.”
As Roger strode away, Droopy turned, apparently to admire the view out of the window of the summer-house, although he had seen it a hundred times before. Thatched House Lodge, in which the Brooks lived, was a most attractive little mansion that earlier in the century had replaced an old hunting lodge which had once been a favourite retreat of Charles I. It was Crown property, and the Prime Minister, young William Pitt, had given Roger a life tenancy of it as a reward for certain highly secret services. The summer-house, however, was contemporary with the original building. It had been embellished in the ’60s with a fine ceiling painted by Angelica Kauffmann, and was lately converted by Roger into a studio, in which he indulged his amateur talent as an artist. Standing on high ground across the lawn from the house, its windows gave a splendid prospect across Richmond Park to the blue haze of the Surrey woods beyond. Suddenly, without looking at Amanda, Droopy spoke:
“M’dear, I have seen this coming for a long time.”
“You heard us, then?”
“I could scarce help doing so, though only the deep affection I bear you both excuses me in referring to it.”
“Roger has good cause for his annoyance,” she defended her husband quickly. “Knowing how fond you are of rich wines, he produced that bottle of Château-Yquem specially for you. As I was aware of his intent I should have provided peaches or white muscats to go with it. But I fear I am an incurably thoughtless creature, so make but a poor housekeeper, and our purse is not long enough to employ a superior woman who would attend to such matters for me.”
“So I gathered,” rejoined Droopy drily. “And while, m’dear, I count your sweet vagueness about the less important things of life no small part of your charm, it distresses me the more to think that your thoughtlessness on this occasion may have been influenced by a necessary economy.”
Amanda shrugged, and with, a rustle of her stiff skirts sat down. “God be thanked we are not yet so reduced that the purchase of a bunch of grapes would involve us in a financial crisis. But during the past two years Roger has earned nothing. His allowance from his father and mine from my uncle are barely enough to support us here. Moving in society, as we do, costs more than we can afford, and both of us, alas, have expensive tastes. Were I a better manager we could perhaps make do, but I have a horror of accounts and no head for them, so it was unjust of me to upbraid him over our unpaid bills.”
“Nonsense, m’dear, he invited your rebuke,” smiled Droopy, taking a seat beside her. “That you should be living beyond your means is as much his fault as yours, but lack of money is not the only reason for the gulf that is opening between you.”
“You—you think, then, that our marriage is doomed to end in failure?”
“By no means. He is devoted to you, and his present irritability arises from a natural instinct which it is beyond his power to control. For months past I have watched his increasing restlessness with much concern, and I have no doubt about its cause. To such an active mind painting and gardening can never be more than stop-gaps. Secretly he is eating his heart out from the feeling that he is wasting the best years of his life, and his financial circumstances are now an additional reason why he should seek some employm
ent.”
For a few moments Amanda did not reply. The scenes of her married life with Roger were coursing swiftly through her mind. First, there had been their wonderful honeymoon in Italy. A sheaf of introductions from diplomats and others with whom Roger’s previous activities had brought him into contact had resulted in a score of invitations to stay in palaces and lovely villas, so that for over six months they had prolonged their carefree wanderings up and down the sunny peninsular. On their return there had been the excitement of settling into Thatched House Lodge, then a brilliant London season in which they were among the most popular newly-weds at innumerable balls and assemblies. In the autumn that followed, Lady Marie Brook’s illness had taken a turn for the worse, and as Roger was very devoted to his mother they had removed to his old home at Lymington to cheer her last months. Amanda, too, had loved Lady Marie dearly, and her death in the previous November had sadly distressed them both, A Christmas visit, carried well into January, to their dearest woman friend, the gay and beautiful Georgina, and her husband, the Earl of St. Ermins, had restored their spirits; but soon after their return to Richmond Amanda had noticed a subtle change in Roger. His painting, instead of improving, had noticeably deteriorated, and although by comparison with most men of that period he was not a heavy drinker, he had formed the habit of consuming a bottle of port every night, even when they were alone. Normally he was easy to please and the most good-tempered of men, but as the spring advanced he had begun to show irritation over trifles and to give way to fits of moodiness, from which she found it increasingly difficult to rouse him. At times she feared that he was tiring of her, but on that cardinal issue, at least, Droopy’s denial had sounded convinced and reassuring. At length she said:
“I deem you right. ’Tis some worth-while task on which to engage his good brain that he requires. But what? He has many accomplishments, yet has been trained to nothing. Moreover, he has an inborn hatred of routine. What possible employment could be found for him that would give real scope to his abilities, yet leave him a reasonable independence?”
Even as Amanda asked the question she knew the answer—and feared it. The shrewd Droopy knew well what was in her mind, so he replied as gently as he could, “M’dear, I know of only one thing which would give him satisfaction—to take up again the old work at which he proved so prodigiously successful.”
Instinctively Amanda shied away from the thought, and cried, “No, no! Not that! ’Twas so damnably dangerous, and on our honeymoon we agreed that he should give it up for good.”
“I know it. Yet travel and excitement have ever been the breath of Roger’s life; ’tis that he really needs to make him his own man again. To have held him for two years is a triumph of which any woman could be proud, but I pray you to consider if the time has not now come when you should release him from any promise he may have made to you.”
“It is too late!” There was a catch in Amanda’s voice as she fought desperately against the thing that she had long been secretly dreading. “Thrice in the past eighteen months Mr. Pitt has sent for him and offered him missions abroad. Each time he has refused them, and after the last occasion the Prime Minister dismissed him almost brutally. Roger told me nothing of these meetings; I learned of them from my Lord Malmesbury. It seems that Mr. Pitt was so incensed by these persistent refusals that he declared that, as Roger would not accept employment when his services were needed, should he ever change his mind he would apply for it in vain. So you see he cannot again play ducks and drakes with his life in the Government’s interest, even should I urge him to it.”
“In that, m’dear, you are mistaken.” Droopy paused a moment, then went on a little hurriedly. “I was with the Prime Minister no longer ago than Friday, and he spoke of Roger’s defection far more in sorrow than in anger. Be brave now, and forgive me the hurt I am about to do you. Mr. Pitt formally charged me with endeavouring to persuade Roger to work for him again, and in the event of my succeeding he requests that Roger should wait upon him tomorrow morning.”
“Oh, Droopy! How could you become a party to seeking to rob me of him?”
“Much as I dislike the task, I had no option. But would you not sooner that Mr. Pitt, rather than some designing woman, took Roger from you?”
“What a strange question! Pray enlighten me.”
Droopy let go the ribbon of his quizzing glass, with which he had been toying, leaned forward and said earnestly, “Surely you are not blind to the alternative that awaits Roger should he refuse this new offer? His nature craves excitement and will secure it one way or another. Given three more months of his present way of life, I vow he’ll be as ripe as a September apple to fall for the next attractive minx who sets her cap at him.”
Amanda sighed. “As far as any wife can be certain of such things, I’d swear that Roger has been faithful to me; but before we married he was the very devil with the women, and what you suggest is a possibility that has recently caused me heartrending apprehension. Yet, if he goes abroad, there seems an even greater risk of his being unfaithful.”
“Mayhap; but I recall your saying to me once yourself that you thought infidelity in a man no serious matter, providing his wife was not humiliated by a public knowledge of it, nor menaced by the loss of first place in her husband’s true affections. Here, if Roger entered on an illicit affair, it would fill his mind to the exclusion of all else, and might even prove disastrous to your marriage. Abroad, his mind being mainly occupied with his mission, all the odds are that it would be an infidelity of so temporary a nature that it would detract nothing from his love for you.
Poor Amanda smiled a little wrily. “That, Droopy, is the sort of cynicism with which I used to armour my heart before I married him. Both of us had previously had tragic love affairs, and had vowed never again to allow our inmost being to become vulnerable to the caprice of a member of the opposite sex. Believing then that he was determined to continue in the service of Mr. Pitt, I accepted it quite calmly that while on his travels he would acquire numerous light-o’-loves. Now, having been his constant companion for two years, ’tis a far harder matter to recapture so detached a view. Yet, even so, I doubt not that in time I could bring myself to it … if only I could be certain that his heart would remain mine.”
As she ceased speaking they both caught sight of Roger approaching across the lawn. He was smiling at them and in his hand he carried a bunch of June roses, that he had evidently just picked as a gesture of contrition for his harsh words to Amanda.
Droopy raised his quizzing glass and twisted it airily, as though he was about to voice some inconsequent witticism, but his whisper came swift and urgent:
“Amanda! If you hold him to his word ’tis a certainty you’ll lose him. If you would keep his heart you must let him go.”
* * * * *
That Sunday evening, after Droopy had left them, Amanda made Roger add up their bills. To his horror he found that they owed over twelve hundred pounds. Having asked Droopy to leave matters in her hands, she then gave Roger Mr. Pitt’s message, declaring as she did so that, as their financial position demanded it and was mainly due to her own mismanagement, she was now fully reconciled to his resuming his old work.
At her self-accusation he protested. It was true that he was by nature much more careful about money matters than herself, but he felt that he was the more to blame for having allowed their liabilities to accumulate unchecked. The frightening total shocked him into a sudden realisation that unless he could procure a considerable sum in the very near future they would find themselves in serious trouble, and he knew Amanda was right about there being only one way in which he could earn a large sum quickly.
She clinched the matter by saying sweetly, “Dearest Roger, even if money were not in question I think the time has come when you should leave me for a while. We have been blessed beyond most in having near two years of happy idleness in which to love each other, and it is not right that a man of your parts should spend all his life dancing attendance
on a woman. By circumstances beyond our control you became when young a soldier without a uniform. Mr. Pitt’s summons means that the country needs you, so you must obey the call of that muffled drum and go forth again to earn new laurels, which though invisible to others make me more than ever proud to be your wife.”
A most touching scene ensued, for she was right in her belief that he had been entirely faithful to her since their marriage—a rare thing for those days—and he was most loath to leave her. Yet Droopy had also been right in that another side of him was becoming soured by inactivity, and once the decision had been taken he could not help having a secret feeling of elation.
Next morning, with all his old vigour and eagerness restored, Roger drove up to No. 10, Downing Street. While he waited downstairs in the inner hall for the great man to receive him, he speculated cheerfully on where he would be sent. France, he knew, was ruled out owing to the circumstances in which he had last left it. The missions he had refused had been to Portugal, the Austrian Netherlands and America. As he would have liked to visit the new world he would not have been at all averse to the last project being revived, but he hoped that it would be Austria or Prussia, as they too were countries to which he had not yet been, and either, or any other European court, would offer the prospect that he might later be able to arrange for Amanda to come out and join him there.
His pleasant musings were interrupted by the tinkle of a bell. At its sound a liveried footman led him upstairs and ushered him into the spacious room on the first floor in which the Prime Minister conducted his business. At a glance Roger saw that nothing had been changed since his last visit. On the desk there stood, as usual, a decanter of port and several glasses; behind it, very erect and imperturbable, sat the Prime Minister.
In this year of grace 1792 William Pitt the younger had reached the peak of his magnificent career. He had become Prime Minister at the age of twenty-four, and in the teeth of a powerful Whig opposition, led by such brilliant and experienced politicians as Fox, Burke and Sheridan, he had enforced innumerable wise measures upon a largely reluctant Parliament and nation.
The Man who Killed the King Page 1
