Chapter 252: Eliminating a National Traitor
The floor-to-ceiling window on the west side of the villa's second floor, along with its frame, had vanished. The wall directly behind it was half collapsed, revealing jagged red bricks. The corridor on the other side of the wall was covered in brick dust and bloodstains, and a hole had been punched through the roof; no one knew how the cannonball had curved upwards to reach it.
The citizens outside let out a roaring wave of cheers. The makeshift gunners felt as if they had personally landed a punch on Count de Tiole, the thrill of vengeance shooting straight to their heads.
A few gunners were about to reload when they suddenly noticed the guards, who had been crouched at various windows aiming their guns outwards, beginning to panic. Most of them retreated back inside the villa.
"Look, those bastards are scared!" someone immediately pointed at the villa and shouted.
"They know their crimes, and they're losing their nerve."
"Everyone, charge in and avenge our loved ones!"
Shouting, the crowd surged towards the villa from all directions. Although sporadic gunshots rang out from the doors and windows, they did nothing to halt the surging tide of people.
Fouché, observing the situation from a short distance away, couldn't help but frown at the sight. The resistance inside the villa had stopped too suddenly.
He immediately realized something and turned to an official beside him, snapping, "They might be trying to escape! Go quickly... no, I'll go myself! You keep a close eye on the surrounding buildings!"
Fouché, disguised as a common merchant, took five of his subordinates and charged into the villa with the rioting crowd.
The entire villa was already in utter chaos, everyone frantically seizing valuables and gleefully destroying everything they could see.
With hysterical shouts, laughter, and faint cries as the main melody, and the crashing of wood and porcelain as the chords, hundreds of people performed a symphony of madness and destruction.
Soon, someone had set fire to the kitchen on the first floor of the villa's south side, and a gentle breeze quickly spread thick smoke throughout the house.
Fouché glanced around and quickly made his way to the staircase.
Mad rioters and guards were locked in struggles everywhere, with people occasionally tumbling down the stairs. Fouché nimbly dodged them and ran all the way up to the second floor.
Before him was an even more chaotic battlefield. Thick smoke had already drifted upstairs, but people paid it no mind, coughing as they lunged at the guards. A few gunshots could be heard sporadically, but any guard who fired was quickly overwhelmed by the surging masses.
Fouché followed the corridor to the villa's central hall, where he saw seven or eight guards gathered outside a room, nervously pointing their guns in all directions.
Several bodies of rioters lay nearby, and a large section of the west wall had collapsed, with a large pile of broken bricks next to it.
He immediately understood: this was the room that had just been hit by the cannonball.
And so many guards gathered here meant there must be someone important inside!
As he pondered how to infiltrate the room, the thick smoke slowly drifted closer. A guard officer ran from the other end of the corridor and yelled at the armed guards, "The fire has spread to the adjacent drinking room! You, you, and you, come with me to put it out!
"Hold on a little longer; Aurore will soon arrive with reinforcements from Count Castex's estate!"
The officer left with a few guards, and the guards at the door waved their hands to disperse the thick smoke, but were quickly overcome, tears streaming from their eyes.
Fouché immediately took a deep breath, signaled to his subordinates behind him, then, taking advantage of the guards struggling with the smoke, he crouched and slipped through the hole in the wall.
There wasn't much smoke inside the room. An officer heard the movement and immediately turned around. Fouché, with a cruel grin, drew the pistol from his waist and pulled the trigger, blasting the man backwards.
Immediately after, Fouché saw a person slumped sideways in an armchair in the center of the room.
The person's face was deathly pale, their wig askew. Startled by the gunshot, they struggled to lift their head and look towards him.
The dust-covered face belonged to none other than the Duke of Orleans.
Fouché holstered his pistol and took a few steps forward, only then noticing that the person in the chair's left arm was gone from the elbow down, the stump tightly bound with bandages. Furthermore, a shard of broken glass, wider than a finger, was embedded in his right back, and though thick bandages were wrapped around the glass, blood continued to drip steadily from its tip.
"You..."
As soon as the Duke of Orleans opened his mouth, his face contorted in pain, followed by a bout of coughing, his lips smeared with bloody foam. Clearly, his lungs had suffered severe damage.
Sounds of fighting between guards and Police Intelligence Bureau agents drifted from outside the door, but they quickly subsided.
Fouché stepped before the Duke of Orleans, staring at him as one would a highly satisfactory painting, and said in a calm tone, "Good morning, Your Grace. It is with regret that I inform you that due to your grave crimes of treason and conspiracy to overthrow the monarchy, His Royal Highness, the esteemed Crown Prince, has instructed me to pass a death sentence upon you on his behalf."
When the Duke of Orleans heard the words 'Crown Prince,' his eyes immediately widened, veins bulging on his forehead. He struggled to say something, but a spasm of pain gripped him. Sweat, like a waterfall, poured down his face, washing away the powder in streaks.
"Yes, His Highness is perfectly aware of all the things you've been doing in secret," Fouché said, nodding, as if guessing what he was about to say. "And then he took action to deal with your... well, how should I put it? Your little games?
"Oh, right, His Highness also has something he wants me to give you."
Fouché retrieved a small silver box from his person, opened it, took out its contents, and unfolded them.
It was a crown folded from paper. The Duke of Orleans stared intently at the paper ring in Fouché's hand, which was painted gold and adorned with drawn jewels, his eyes bloodshot. He wanted to roar aloud and tear the paper ring to shreds, but found himself like a frozen worm, utterly unable to move.
Fouché placed the vividly crafted 'crown' on the Duke of Orleans's head, then drew a dagger and chuckled softly. "His Highness said he understands your lifelong desire to ascend the throne very well. However, this is all you are fit to wear."
As he spoke, he raised the dagger, but discovered that the Duke's body had suddenly slumped in the chair.
Fouché frowned, stepped forward and felt for the Duke of Orleans's carotid artery, then let out a disgruntled sigh and returned the dagger to its sheath.
Not long after, a dozen or so Police Intelligence Bureau agents left Count de Tiole's villa from different directions, each carrying dishes, candlesticks, and similar items, looking exactly like the ordinary rioters.
Then the agents on perimeter duty also withdrew one after another, like a few inconspicuous drops of water amidst the thousand rioters.
...
Versailles Palace.
Mirabeau indicated with a hand to his chest to Queen Marie: "Your Majesty, you see, those who opposed this proposal have clearly been convinced. This is a much-anticipated reform. The nobility, with their noble character, have relinquished some small privileges, bringing immense hope to countless peasants."
As he spoke, he glanced at the petitioning nobles outside the window.
Those were the emerging nobles who supported the 'abolition of aristocratic privileges,' while the ranks of the Old Nobility had already lowered their flags and silenced their drums.
The core figures among the Old Nobility had long since lost the will to concern themselves with political affairs—nine of them had been killed by rioters in their homelands. The rest had seen their estates utterly destroyed; not just their manors smashed or burned, but, more importantly, all their valuables, land deeds, bonds, and other documents were lost, even proof of their noble lineage had vanished.
In this era, nobles without property befitting their status would lose their distinguished standing, and their political influence would also dissipate.
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