“With a small collar, intended, as you see, to line the collar of the waistcoat or the cravat.”
The king took the waistcoat in his hands and examined it very minutely.
The queen, on observing this eagerness, was perfectly transported.
The king, on his part, appeared delighted, counting the rings of this fairy net which undulated beneath his fingers with all the flexibility of knitted wool.
“Why,” exclaimed he, “this is admirable steel!”
“Is it not, Sire?”
“It is a perfect miracle of art.”
“Is it not?”
“I really cannot imagine where you can have procured this.”
I bought it last night, Sire, of a man who long since wished me to purchase it of him, in the event of your going out on a campaign.”
“It is admirable! admirable!” repeated the king, examining it as an artist.
“And it will fit you as well as a waistcoat made by your tailor, Sire.”
“Oh, do you believe that?”
“Try it on.”
The king said not a word, but took off his violet-colored coat. The queen trembled with joy; she assisted Louis XVI. in taking off his orders, and Madame Campan the rest. The king, however, unbuckled his sword and laid it on the table.
If any one at that moment had contemplated the face of the queen, they would have seen it lit up by one of those triumphant smiles which supreme felicity alone bestows.
The king allowed her to divest him of his cravat, and the delicate fingers of the queen placed the steel collar round his neck. Then Marie Antoinette herself fastened the hooks of his corselet, which adapted itself beautifully to the shape of the body, being lined throughout with a fine doe-skin, for the purpose of presenting any uncomfortable pressure from the steel.
This waistcoat was longer than an ordinary cuirass; it covered the whole body. With the waistcoat and shirt over it, it did not increase the volume of the body even half a line. It did not in the slightest degree inconvenience any movement of the wearer.
“Is it very heavy?” asked the queen.
“No.”
“Only see, my king, it is a perfect wonder, is it not?” said the queen, clapping her hands, and turning to Madame Campan, who was just buttoning the king’s ruffles.
Madame Campan manifested her joy in as artless a manner as did the queen.
“I have saved my king!” cried Marie Antoinette. “Test this invisible cuirass; prove it; place it upon a table; try if you can make any impression upon it with a knife; try if you can make a hole through it with a ball; try it! try it!”
“Oh!” exclaimed the king, with a doubting air.
“Only try it!” repeated she, with enthusiasm.
“I would willingly do so from curiosity,” replied the king.
“You need not do so; it would be superfluous, Sire.”
“How! it would be superfluous that I should prove to you the excellence of this marvel of yours?”
“Ah! thus it is with all the men. Do you believe that I would have given faith to the judgment of another,—of an indifferent person, when the life of my husband, the welfare of France, was in question?”
“And yet, Antoinette, it seems to me that this is precisely what you have done,—you have put faith in another.”
The queen shook her head with a delightfully playful obstinacy.
“Ask her!” said she, pointing to the woman who was present,—”ask our good Campan there what we have done this morning?”
“What was it, then? Good Heaven!” ejaculated the king, completely puzzled.
“This morning—what am I saying?—this night, after dismissing all the attendants, we went, like two mad-brained women, and shut ourselves up in her room, which is at the far end of the wing occupied by the pages. Now, the pages were sent off last night to prepare the apartments at Rambouillet; and we felt well assured that no one could interrupt us before we had executed our project.”
“Good Heaven! you really alarm me! What were the designs, then, of these two Judiths?”
“Judith effected less, and certainly with less noise. But for that, the comparison would be marvellously appropriate. Campan carried the bag which contained this breast-plate; as for me, I carried a long hunting-knife which belonged to my father,—that infallible blade which killed so many wild boars.”