On the right bank of the Seine stood the H?tel de Ville, the Paris City Hall—an Italian-designed Renaissance complex, grand and imposing from without, spacious and radiant within. Completed in 1628, its pyramid-capped fa?ade had, since that day, shared in the trinity of Parisian power with the Palais de Justice and the Tuileries Palace.

  On 15 July 1789, Jean-Sylvain Bailly

  Each morning, when the tricolour flag atop the City Hall first caught the sun, Bailly was already at his desk, absorbed in municipal affairs—a routine he had maintained almost daily since the previous July. But on the morning of 17 April, cloaked in black, his wide-brimmed hat adorned with the tricolour cockade, the mayor paused before the notice board on the Place de Grève.

  He frowned. The freshly pasted broadsheets bore words such as “tax-farming,” “conspiracy,” “persecution.”

  His first impulse was immediate and fierce:

  “Have this rubbish removed at once!”

  Since the previous summer, when a mob had lynched the former Governor of Paris and flung the victim’s heart into his office, Bailly had developed an instinctive loathing for every sans-culotte poster and inflammatory placard. He had decreed that no seditious or violent writings were to be displayed upon the square.

  “Sir, there’s a problem,” stammered his aide, scratching his head uneasily. “The patrolmen say this particular article was authorised for posting on the walls of the Palais de Justice and The Manège Hall—the Assembly itself. If we…”

  Bailly fell silent. The Palais de Justice, the National Assembly, and the City Hall had become the new triad of Parisian authority. As for the foolish, corpulent king at the Tuileries, ever since the day he refused to mount a horse, no ambitious citizen had deemed him worthy of allegiance—only of exploitation.

  The divine monarchy of the Bourbons was dying, quietly devoured.

  Suppressing his anger, Bailly read the text to its end.

  The signature at the bottom made him clench his jaw: André Franck.

  Without a word, he ascended to the second floor.

  Like most men, Bailly detested the tax-farming system and agreed with some of the article’s points:

  “Tax-farming negates the law, erodes the base, endangers the treasury, drains the source, and destroys the continuity of national revenue.”

  But the rest filled him with dread.

  “Tax-farming came into this world drenched in blood and filth. Its history of plunder is written in letters of fire and blood. The foul relics of this feudal evil must be wiped out, and its perpetrators brought before the tribunal of the people.”

  He shut the paper, appalled.

  Outside a nearby chamber, Bailly stopped and asked a sentry, a young Private with a musket slung over his shoulder, “Is the Commandant still asleep?”

  Since July 1789, Lafayette had commanded the Paris National Guard; by October he had become titular chief of the entire French militia. In practice, however, the provinces obeyed him little.

  The guard grinned and stepped aside. Bailly entered without knocking, shaking awake the sleeping commander sprawled across a couch.

  “What now? Another riot?” Lafayette groaned, half-asleep. Since taking command, every rude awakening had meant trouble—mobs stirred by agitators, officials murdered, or the royal palace besieged.

  “Not yet,” said Bailly grimly, “but soon.” He described the offending broadsheet. “That lawyer, André Franck, has gone too far. The courts and the Assembly have sided with his barbarous crusade, bypassing the City Hall. It is a mockery of law—an affront to order.”

  Lafayette rose, splashed his face with water, adjusted his hair and cravat, and in moments regained his habitual poise—that union of vanity and charm that had so captivated Parisian salons. He listened attentively, but for once did not echo his friend’s indignation.

  “My apologies, my dear Bailly,” he said at last. “The posting had my consent. I meant to inform you, but your secretary told me you were at the Academy library, replying to questions from the students of the Collège Louis-le-Grand. In truth, both the Palais de Justice and the Assembly agreed that Franck’s article incited no violence. It merely demanded the abolition of tax-farming and the prosecution of those who had diverted public revenue.”

  There was another, unspoken reason for Lafayette’s indulgence: the thirty tax-farmers named by André would be compelled to repay half of their stolen taxes—a sum between 60 and 100 million livres. The City Hall, representing the National Guard and the Prefecture of Police, would share in the recovery.

  At that moment Lafayette desperately needed funds to reorganize the forty-eight district battalions into a disciplined force of 24,000 men—a citizen army worthy to rival the Marquis de Bouillé’s German Legion at Metz.

  Unlike the leftists who howled for every tax-farmer’s head, André had chosen a subtler path: through quiet bargains with the judiciary, the tax committee of the Assembly, and the City Hall, he had already planned the division of spoils. A collective crime, he believed, was the firmest bond of unity—just as a common ideal once had been.

  He had bypassed Bailly precisely because of the mayor’s friendship with Lavoisier, himself a tax-farmer and patron of the Academy. Many of those wealthy financiers funded scientific institutions by the hundreds of thousands of livres each year.

  Lafayette, seeing Bailly’s displeasure, spoke gently: “Franck—he prefers to be called André—assures us the new court will be fiscal, not criminal. The intent is to reclaim funds, not to shed blood.”

  “When did this André become a prosecutor—or a judge?” Bailly demanded. “A junior lawyer from the Palais de Justice wielding such influence? Is he moderate, or radical?”

  Lafayette laughed. “My friend, he is both—and neither. A born politician, perhaps even blessed by Providence. Last October, he defended a provincial agitator yet contrived to expel Marat and Hébert from Paris; he now commands the Cordeliers Club while working hand in glove with the police; he comes from the Palais de Justice, yet has allies in the Assembly. I never liked the man—but I cannot ignore him. If I must compare him… he is another Mirabeau: without moral scruple, obsessed with law’s letter, mixing nobility and deceit. But he’s younger, handsomer, writes verse—my nieces swoon over his ‘If Life Betrays You’.”

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  To compare any young man to Mirabeau had become fashionable among Parisian elites. The Comte de Mirabeau himself, naturally, dismissed such talk with contempt.

  At the Manège Hall, during the Assembly’s noon recess, Mirabeau waved his hairy arms and complained to Talleyrand, Bishop of Autun:

  “That wretch from Reims—even last night, while the Marquise de Nores and I were making love, she moaned his name, reciting his verses between gasps!”

  The bishop merely smiled, leaning on his cane, eyes sweeping the crowd. “My dear Comte,” he murmured, “that wretch was your pupil. He observed your speeches in the Assembly twelve times.”

  “Thirteen!” roared Mirabeau, thumping his chest. “One time from the deputies’ bench itself, when I flayed Necker alive. Yes, I noticed the Reims man—and Robespierre too—but I never thought André would rise so fast.”

  Talleyrand nodded. “Indeed. The restless Left now moves at his bidding. I expect a decree on the tax-farms within days.”

  “Do you support it?” Mirabeau asked slyly.

  “I prefer,” said Talleyrand gravely, “to walk with the victors.”

  “You cunning cripple.”

  “A poor, cunning cripple.”

  They both laughed, just as the presiding deputy rang the Assembly bell to end recess.

  Toward evening, the Palais-Royal gardens were still alive with visitors. Shops under the arcades buzzed with trade; couples strolled among the blooming marguerites; stockbrokers loosened their cravats to watch the girls in their light spring dresses; street vendors brushed past courtesans with thieving hands, drawing shrieks that delighted the men in the cafés.

  It was the finest afternoon of the season. Every tree exhaled perfume; every bird upon its branch or thorn sang an ode to love.

  From his balcony above, the Duc d’Orléans basked in the light and noise, face upturned to the sun as though to divine benediction.

  When a knock sounded at the door, he turned languidly. His secretary, Laclos, entered to hear his master murmur:

  “I should like to stand in the Tuileries, to receive the people’s cheers. Louis XVI is unworthy to be king of France.”

  Only before his faithful Laclos did the Duc speak so plainly.

  “No, Your Grace,” the secretary replied smoothly. “Versailles is where you belong—the Tuileries are too small to contain your ambition.”

  Eight years had passed since Laclos first entered his service, binding his fortunes to the Orléans cause and weaving its intrigues:

  In 1785, the necklace affair that ruined Queen Antoinette;

  In 1787, urging the Duc to side with the magistrates of the Palais de Justice against the crown;

  In 1789, persuading him to renounce his noble rank and join the Third Estate;

  That July, spurring Desmoulins to call the people to arms and storm the Bastille.

  Each had been a triumph of manipulation.

  According to the next stage of his plan, during the women’s march on Versailles that October, the Duc was to declare himself Regent of France once the royal couple were slain. But a careless word to a mistress betrayed the scheme. The rumour spread, and Lafayette’s National Guard reached Versailles in time to save the King.

  One mistake led to another. Lafayette, seeking peace, spared the Duc but, with Mirabeau and Talleyrand, persuaded him to accept exile as royal envoy to England.

  Laclos had protested in vain. By March 1790, the Duc returned to Paris—stripped of reputation, despised alike by nobles and deputies.

  In despair, his hairline had retreated; only Laclos remained loyal, labouring to rebuild his image among all classes.

  “This afternoon,” said the Duc, “Paulze and two tax-farmers came to see me. I pled illness, refused the meeting, but they left a draft—100,000 livres.” He produced the cheque and placed it upon the desk.

  Laclos smiled. “Not enough, my lord. It must be 60 million—even 100 million—to merit your intercession.”

  “100 million?” the Duc exclaimed. “Can they afford it?”

  “Easily,” said Laclos. “André and I have calculated the figure precisely. It will make the leeches bleed without killing them.”

  “André… André Franck.” The Duc repeated the name slowly. “Will he, too, pledge his loyalty as Danton once did?”

  “Mutual cooperation only, Your Grace,” Laclos corrected. “Even Danton never swore allegiance to you—neither in public nor in private.”

  The Duc scowled. He despised lawyers more than courtesans: the latter at least earned their fee honestly, while lawyers cloaked greed in virtue and procedure. Yet he could not do without them—especially the ambitious young ones. Laclos had told him André held no faith in Louis XVI.

  “The day the King refused to mount his horse,” André had said, “was the day he lost my allegiance.”

  The Duc picked up the cheque again and handed it to Laclos. “Give it to André,” he said.

  “A token of my congratulations—for the victory he will win tomorrow.”

  That evening, André sat alone in his garret, flicking the slip of paper between his fingers, listening to its rustle with sheer delight.

  100,000 livres. A gift from the Duc d’Orléans, delivered by Laclos himself.

  “Magnificent,” André murmured. “Far more generous than Marat ever was. Pity the Duc lacks courage. To win a crown, one must seize it with blood and fire—as Henry IV, as Louis XIV, as Napoleon shall one day do. But intrigue alone wins nothing.”

  Still, this cheque was but the first of many. Whatever storm might come, he now possessed an escape fund.

  He had just locked the drawer when he heard hurried footsteps on the stairs—Meldar’s.

  “Monsieur André! They’re here—the bad men—the tax-farmers!” the boy panted. “But Sergeant Hoche stopped them at the door!”

  André exhaled, reassured. He drew two pistols from a chest beneath his bed, tucked them under his coat—Legendre’s parting gift.

  “Stay upstairs,” he ordered. “No matter what happens.”

  “The Polish aren’t cowards,” Meldar protested, and followed anyway.

  At the foot of the stairs André paused, startled—the intruder was not a ruffian but Madame Lavoisier herself. Hoche had barred her coachmen outside.

  “Whatever you have to say, madame,” André said curtly, “say it here. I’m preparing for tomorrow’s hearing.”

  Her teeth clenched, her lips trembling with rage. This man had unleashed a storm against her husband and his peers.

  Across Paris—in the City Hall, the Assembly, the courts, the cafés, even the drill-fields—André’s broadsides condemning the fermiers-généraux were pasted on every wall. Nearly every paper echoed them; those few that defended the tax system were besieged by mobs, their doors smeared with filth. The police turned a blind eye: after all, according to the Declaration of the Rights of Man, citizens had the right to express their opinions—and filth, unlike violence, shed no blood.

  The tax-farmers had tried to rally their allies in vain. City Hall and the courts shut their doors; the Assembly silenced any deputy who spoke in their defence; only a few scientists in the Academy—Condorcet, Legendre, Monge—dared voice sympathy, and faintly at that; as for the royal couple at the Tuileries, they pitied but could not protect.

  Even the carriages of the tax-farmers were pelted with rotten leaves and dung in full view of the police. That evening, Madame Lavoisier had come in a plain hired carriage—one fit for servants.

  “The Chatelet court will sentence your client Babeuf to two years for manslaughter,” she said coldly. “In return, you’ll receive 30,000 livres. Consider it your fee.”

  André smiled thinly. “Madame, you are not the prosecutor; you have no standing to bargain with me. And let me remind you—the great, honourable, and righteous André cannot be bought. So, please—leave.”

  She stamped her foot. “You’ll lose tomorrow!”

  André shrugged. “Perhaps. But the verdict is irrelevant now.” The Babeuf case had already become a pretext; his real victory was political, not legal—and tomorrow, he would unveil his trump card.

  Outside, Hoche had floored the lady’s servants; a passing constable, eager to please André, waved his handcuffs and swore to arrest the “attackers.” André flipped him a silver livre and nodded toward the door. “Let them go.”

  The lady fled, half-carried to her carriage. Her coachman whipped the horses, vanishing into the night.

  “30,000 livres!” cried Meldar from the stairwell. “How much is that, monsieur?” He tried to count on his fingers, but gave up.

  Surely a man as noble as André would never take a bribe.

  He could not imagine that, locked safely in the desk above, another piece of paper waited—worth 100,000 livres.

  Note:

  H?tel de Ville — Paris City Hall.

  Palais de Justice — Paris High Court.

  The Manège Hall — The former royal riding school, home of the National Assembly.

  Académie des Sciences: The French Academy of Sciences is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French scientific research.