Chapter 97: Shine or Go Crazy (1) "..."
"Can I sit and talk, Desaix?"
"When you kicked me out claiming I was pro-revolution, when was that? And now what is this all of a sudden?"
"Yes, it's true—I threw you out. Man, this chair's really comfortable. Did you bring it, or was it already in this annex?"
"Did you come here to mock me, Brigadier General?"
"Mock you? You try being in your fifties first. Your body isn't the same as when you're young. Don't just stand there gaping—sit down too."
Dumouriez said that as he took off his hat and set it on the table beside the chair.
"Listen, Desaix."
"Yes, Brigadier General Dumouriez."
"May I ask you a few things?"
"You already locked me up here, and you still want something from me. That's unsettling. Isn't it already lucky I'm not trying to escape?"
"Hah. You, a soldier to the bone, disobeying orders and trying to escape? Before I'd believe that, I'd sooner believe Finance Minister Guillaume de Toulon is a royalist."
"...Brigadier General, did you pick a star out of the sky with your mouth?"
"Haha. You're an amusing one."
Dumouriez snorted, then wiped the smile clean off his face and began to speak.
"Alright. Jokes end here. Deputy Captain of the Royal Guard, Major Antoine Desaix."
"..."
"Major Antoine Desaix—do you now feel like sincerely serving His Majesty the King?"
"No matter how many times you ask, I serve only the safety of France and the people, Brigadier General."
"...Is that so?"
"Yes."
"Even if it costs you your life?"
As he said it, Dumouriez drew a pistol from his waist and aimed it at Desaix.
"...If you're a soldier, you can lose your life for the people's safety."
Desaix's eyelids trembled, but there wasn't a hint of shake in his voice.
"Haha! Good! If you're a soldier, that's the mindset you should have! The irritation I got from banging heads with those idiots just vanished."
Beaming, Dumouriez shoved the pistol back into his belt.
"Listen, Desaix. I'll speak plainly. Louis XVII—Orléans, that is—has to lose. No, not a setting sun. A falling sun."
"...What are you talking about all of a sudden? Weren't you a royalist, General?"
At Dumouriez's sudden words, Desaix answered with a frown.
When people said "royalist," they meant Dumouriez, and when they said Dumouriez, they meant "royalist," didn't they?
"Hah. Royalist, my ass."
"...?"
"I just thought it was a chance to pin on one more star. From the start, I had no interest in being royalist or revolutionary. I just got swept up in the current and ended up standing on the royalist side."
Dumouriez spoke with a scoff.
He was the sort who always rode the winning side all the way to another star.
Under this event called "revolution," he'd only taken too long to figure out who would win. If he'd known Orléans was the losing side, there was no reason to board the same ship.
And there was certainly no reason to stake his life on loyalty.
"But now that Louis XVII is trying to crush the Assembly by force, and trample Paris while he's at it—what do you think happens then?"
"There will be bloodshed."
"Bloodshed? Bloodshed, my ass. From what I see, the killing won't stop until either the king or the citizens are completely erased. I'll even bet on it."
"Then do the royalists have troops?"
"Twenty thousand inside the country. Add deserters and nobles' mercenaries led by the Count of Artois at the border, and it's about thirty thousand."
"Then it sounds like there's at least a chance."
"A chance? Hahaha! A chance, my ass."
Dumouriez laughed for a while, then pulled out a cigar from his pocket as he spoke.
"Didn't I say the king is a setting sun? This is a losing fight, plain as day. I've been ground through years in the field and logistics—do you think I wouldn't know? Do you think the Count of Artois—that idiot—can beat the army Commander Lafayette leads? He'll get smashed somewhere around the Flanders border, obviously.
"And the twenty thousand inside the country? Ha! If the National Guard blocks Reims and Troyes and holds, can the guard holding alone in Versailles arrive before it's wiped out? They won't even break through the defensive line in the first place."
He clipped the end of the cigar with cigar scissors and lit it with a match.
"You're young, so you don't know, but once you become a general and get older, there are times your gut starts screaming. And right now, that gut is warning me this is very dangerous."
"I see..."
Dumouriez drew the cigar deep into his lungs, then exhaled as he continued.
"On top of that, Finance Minister Guillaume de Toulon is glaring like a blade and threatening to kill every royalist."
"...Finance Minister Guillaume de Toulon?"
"That's right. Do you know how slippery and terrifying that man is? A nineteen-year-old brat, yet he's that good at political tricks. Damn it—just thinking about it makes my hands shake."
"What did the Finance Minister do to make it that bad? Did he send a threatening letter?"
"...He ate a meal."
"Pardon?"
Desaix tilted his head and asked again.
What did eating have to do with anything? How could a person live without eating?
"Why—doesn't that make sense? Haha. You won't earn a star, I see. He ate in front of the Palais-Royal. Yes—right in front of Orléans's residence. Twice, without escorts, he strolled leisurely through the royalists' front yard. If that isn't a wordless threat, then what is?"
"Tsk."
"Hoo."
"That's why I need you."
After drawing in the cigar again, Dumouriez went on.
"With me shut in this annex, what do you think I can do that you'd come in person for this, General?"
"Because you're clean, unlike the other guards. If you were pushed out of the guard after the king changed, even the revolutionaries will at least listen to you, won't they?"
Who would've thought that purging the guard during its reorganization—suspending anyone loyal to Louis XVI or showing even a hint of pro-revolution leanings—would come back like this?
Now that he could see a path out—powered by cigar smoke—Dumouriez seemed to settle down.
"This is a detailed operational outline I made in secret. Take this and bring it to Finance Minister Guillaume de Toulon. That man will understand my conversion."
"Then what do I get?"
"What else? I'll get you out of this stifling annex. And until things calm down, how about going down to your hometown for a while—call it recuperation."
"...That's your promise, General."
"With my life hanging on your hands, how could I break it?"
Late July, 1790.Kingdom of France, Paris.
"So! I told you exactly, didn't I! 'Prepare grapeshot!' Hah. Even now, thinking about it—it kills!"
"If I hear it one more time, that'll make it a hundred. Please, stoppppp."
"Hey, we're meeting again after a long time—shouldn't we clear the air a bit?!"
Clear the air? You wanted to clear the air?
Yeah. Clear it. Sure.
But why are you clearing the air in my office instead of a tavern—storming in here, drinking my Secret Edition wine, in broad daylight?
And why the hell did you bring Grouchy too?
That bastard has eaten ten servings of fries in two days. My inventory assets are vanishing into the sky!
"This isn't Austria—why are you conducting a pitch warfare tactic?"
"What are you saying, Guillaume! A soldier must keep his belly full to perform in the field!"
"Could you stop making up weird reasons and just say you're eating because you want to?"
"Then Guillaume, eat with me too. Here—dip it and eat. Tomato sauce!"
...I want to fry you until the outside is moist and the inside is crisp.
God. Why didn't you give me a status window? In anime or novels, they always open the status window and fire off magic and all that.
Do I not get any reincarnation perks?
"Hey, what are you thinking about so long? More importantly—look at my epaulets! How are they? Handsome, right?"
"Wow, gold. So handsome. Wow."
"I'm a colonel, a colonel!"
"Wow, I'm a second lieutenant, that's really amaaaazing."
"Haha! Right?!"
"Colonel Bonaparte? I think you've had too much to drink in broad daylight, so I'd like you to flop onto that chair and sleep. What do you think?"
"Heehee, cork-launch!"
Mm, so he can't even hear me anymore? He's put his mouth straight on the bottle and is chugging.
Come to think of it, that was the Provence rosé wine Representative Talleyrand gave me. How much was it again?
Whatever. I'll ask Representative Talleyrand later and put that amount on his tab.
Knock knock knock.
Damn it—after a drunk chugging bottle after bottle and a pig that keeps eating nonstop, what kind of uninvited guest is it now?
I opened the office door with dread and said,
"Who is it? Ears of the Nation is closed today."
"...Are you Finance Minister Guillaume de Toulon?"
A black-haired man who looked about my age asked, ignoring what I said.
"...Yes. And?"
"I am Major Antoine Desaix, Your Excellency."
No wonder the man himself felt so stiff.
"What brings you here?"
"Captain of the Royal Guard Dumouriez has something he wishes to convey to you, Your Excellency."
Dumouriez?
Wasn't he the reactionary royalist leader?
Why would he—?
Jacobin Monastery.Cordeliers Club.
"...Is it true? Are you telling me it's certain?"
"Yes, Monsieur Hébert. It's certain. I saw it clearly with my own eyes. A Royal Guard went in and came out of Finance Minister Guillaume de Toulon's residence."
"How did you know he was Royal Guard?"
"As you instructed, I followed him. I saw him enter an annex palace in Versailles."
The errand boy spoke with eyes blazing, full of certainty.
"...Understood. Leave me. I need some time alone."
"Yes, Monsieur."
The errand boy nodded and left the room.
The hand of Jacques René Hébert, clenched into a fist, trembled violently.
Dizzying.
What would have happened if he hadn't put surveillance on that hypocrite?
So that was why he never even blinked while slaughtering the people in the Holy Roman Empire.
Disgusting, filthy hypocrite.
In front, he pretended to be for the citizens, while behind the scenes he kissed mouths with the revolution's enemies—royalists.
No. That wasn't it.
From the start, wasn't he bourgeois blood, noble blood? Yes—blood mixed with the blood of trash and pigs who suck the people dry and fatten their bellies.
Guillaume was, from the beginning, no different from an enemy of the revolution.
How many times had he swallowed a sickening laugh while watching us get fooled by that image—the so-called "face of the revolution"?
But I, Hébert, am different from fools like Danton and Robespierre, who were dazzled by Guillaume's lies.
"After all, the people's shackles must be undone by the people."
Hébert murmured as he stroked the barrel of an English-made pistol on the desk.
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