He tried to
obtain from the Queen some written promise.
'He was right,' said Eustace.
'Right!' cried my mother. 'What! to seek to bind Her Majesty down by
written words, like a base mechanical bourgeois? I am ashamed of
you, my son! No, indeed, we all cried out upon him, Archbishop
though he were, and told him that Her Majesty's word was worth ten
thousand bonds.'
'May it be so proved!' muttered Eustace, while my mother went on to
describe how the Coadjutor was pressed, pushed, and almost dragged
down the great stair-case to speak to the infuriated people who were
yelling and shrieking outside the court. Monsieur de Meilleraye went
before him, backed by all the light horse drawn up in the court, and
mounting his horse, drew his sword crying, 'Vive le Roi! Liberty for
Broussel!' he was met by a cry of 'To arms, to arms!' and there was
a rush against him, some trying to pull him off his horse, and one
attacking him with a rusty old sword. The Marshal fired at him and
he fell, severely wounded, just as the Coadjutor came down, and
seeing him lying in the gutter like one dead, knelt down by him,
heard his confession, and absolved him.
(It was afterwards said that the man was a pick-lock, but we always
suspected that the Coadjutor had made the worst of him by way of
enhancing a good story.)
Just as the absolution was finished, some more of the mob came up,
and one threw a stone which hit the Archbishop on the cheek, and
another pointed a musket at him.
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