Farewell, My Queen

After half an hour, he had to get a reader to take his place. I’d never seen anything like it: a speaker in the middle of inflicting a punishing schoolroom assignment on his listeners and giving up on it before they do!”
“And you’ll never see anything like it again. At any rate not involving Necker.”
“Why so? Don’t tell me he’s learned how to be interesting.”
“That, I doubt, but in any case, there is no more Necker. He’s been dismissed. Had you not heard? He was dismissed on Saturday. That’s the big news of the moment.”
“My animals are very ill-informed. And so, as a result, am I. But, my word, Necker dismissed! Now that is good news. Tell me all about it.”
“All I know is that on the eleventh—Saturday, then—at three in the afternoon, his friend Count La Luzerne, Secretary of State for Naval Affairs, came to him bringing a letter in the King’s name. His Majesty requested that he resign and discreetly leave the country.”
“If it had been me, I would have thrown him in prison.”
“That’s exactly what Baron de Breteuil says. He wanted Necker arrested.”
“That opening session of the Estates-General was sheer torture. A two-hour speech, and from that lout! Hundreds and hundreds of figures. A crashing bore should never be forgiven. But, my dear friend, you are obviously far too modest. The truth is that you are magnificently well informed. You didn’t find that kind of news in the novels of Madame de La Fayette, Marivaux, or Madame de Tencin.”
“You flatter me, sir. Everyone knows about Necker. Nobody is talking about anything else. For my part, it all makes my head spin. Fortunately, Monsieur Moreau quite likes to sit me down and explain what is happening. Or at least to the extent that I can follow his thought, for he contemplates History from such a height that he can distinguish neither trifles nor anecdotes. He embraces only the essential.”
“And what does our gentleman Historiographer of France have to say about the dismissal of that jackass?”
“Like everyone else, he ardently desired it. He continues, however, to say: ‘There’s going to be trouble.’ But he’s been saying that for many a day.”
Laroche’s face clouded over momentarily; just long enough for a great idea to come to him.
“If they’ve dismissed Necker, then his post is vacant! I’ll be a first-rate Minister of Finance. I’ll retrench in fine style, frills and essentials will both have to go. I’ll start with the essentials; by the time I get around to doing away with the frills, the French will long since have lost the strength to protest.”
“Take care. If you go too far in your attempt to cut expenditures, you’re apt to get cut from the cabinet yourself. That’s what led to Necker’s downfall. His tendency to economize, his excessive concern about matters of food supplies, and his timidity when faced with the disruptive influences so prevalent in Paris, his reluctance to strike hard and strike fast. He gave the impression of wavering, of tacking and turning . . . ”
Laroche began to laugh—with that abrupt laugh of his that did not allow others to share in the laughter. (He had that in common with his King: not, as he liked to think, the same good judgment, but the same laugh.)
“Look how green it is hereabouts, those days of rain are what did the trick,” he had added, turning toward the meadows that bordered the Menagerie.
Close by, there was a vast farm; its tenants exploited that part of the grounds, and its splendid herds grazed indiscriminately among the fallow deer and the roe deer, supplying some part of the milk products needed by the Court. The remaining part was provided by the farm at the Petit Trianon. This side of the grounds gave an impression of lush green abundance. It made one think of Switzerland, if Monsieur de Besenval, who came from Switzerland, was to be believed. For my part, I was born beside the sea, so it didn’t remind me of anything at all.
The Captain turned his attention away from this rural scene. He likewise ignored the Pheasantry lying next to the farm and turned instead to face the Saint-Cyr road, at one end of the Menagerie.
“No one goes by along that road. What purpose does it serve? The convicts from the prison repair it regularly. They bring a bit of life to the place for a few weeks. They certainly sing well, those fellows! And then they vanish. And there’s nobody there anymore.”
“And don’t people on horseback use the road?”
“Small chance of that! If they’re gentry, they consider a road to be a restraint on their freedom. They simply ride cross-country. Just like at the customs house when you come to enter Paris: a young man of good birth doesn’t slow down. He whips up his team, and any customs employee who has the nerve to try and stop him gets sent flying. That’s how it was when I was a young fellow, and I’m sure it’s still the same.”
“I never go to Paris. Heaven forbid I ever should!”
“Nor do I. What would take me there? That’s why I’m telling you about my younger days.”
“And did you behave like a young man of good birth?”
“Of course. I always drove into Paris at a gallop. I can still hear the shouts of the passersby. The watch didn’t dare to stop me. He took it out on the ones who looked poor and needy. He would vent his fury by thrusting his pike into wagon loads of hay to fish out any stowaways.”
“Fish them out?”
“Or finish them off! . . . The King is too benevolent . . . He sacrifices himself for the sake of his people. A pack of good-for-nothings who don’t deserve his benevolence. He builds roads for them, and cities, orders the ports to be fortified and sends ships out to sea. The wiser course is not to do anything. Not build, not repair. Just let everything fall to bits