On the Right Bank of the Seine stood the Hôtel de Ville of Paris—a Renaissance-style architectural complex designed by Italians. Majestic and imposing on the outside, spacious and luminous within, it had since 1686 shared the symbolic weight of power in Paris with the Palais de Justice and the Tuileries Palace (and formerly, Versailles). Its square roof crowned with a flat-topped pyramid gave it the air of permanence, stability, and solemn authority.
On July 15th, 1789, Jean Sylvain Bailly became the new master of this place. A renowned astronomer, member of the French Academy of Sciences, former President of the Estates-General (the precursor to the National Constituent Assembly), and initiator of the famous Tennis Court Oath, Bailly had accumulated more titles and glory than any mayor before him.
Each morning, as the first rays of sunlight struck the tricolor flag atop the tower of the Hôtel de Ville, Mayor Bailly would already be seated at his desk, attending to state affairs. Since the previous July, he had kept to this near-daily routine—Sundays being the sole exception.
But on the morning of April 17th, wrapped in a black cloak, a tricolor cockade pinned to his wide-brimmed felt hat, and dressed plainly like a dutiful civil servant, Mayor Bailly did not yet ascend to his office. Instead, he paused before the city's public notice board on the esplanade of the Place de Grève.
There, pasted in bold letters, were words like "tax farming," "conspiracy," and "persecution." Bailly's immediate reaction was to command the Hôtel de Ville staff to "take down all this rubbish at once!"
Since that fateful July when a mob lynched the former governor of Paris and flung the man's heart through his office window, Bailly had developed a visceral aversion to anything that resembled the inflammatory broadsheets of the sans-culottes. He had made it quite clear: no provocative or violent posters were to be tolerated in the square of the Hôtel de Ville.
"Sir, there's a bit of a problem," said one of his aides awkwardly as he approached. He scratched his head and hesitated before continuing, "The patrol officers report that this article has already been approved for posting in the Place du Palais de Justice and on the outer walls of the École Militaire—the very seat of the National Assembly. If we…"
The Palais de Justice, the National Assembly, and the Hôtel de Ville now formed the new triangle of power in Paris. As for the foolish, rotund man still living in the Tuileries—ever since he had refused to mount a horse, not a single ambitious citizen regarded Louis XVI as worthy of loyalty. Useful, perhaps. But not worthy. The divine authority of the Bourbons was being carved away piece by piece.
The aide's words inflamed Bailly's temper, but he swallowed his fury. He silently read through the article, signed by one "André-Franck," then turned away and climbed the marble steps to the second floor of the Hôtel de Ville.
Like most men of reason, Bailly had no particular love for the tax farming system or the men who enriched themselves by it. He could agree with several points raised in the article: "Tax farming undermines the law, erodes the tax base, jeopardizes the treasury, and dries up public revenue streams. It threatens the continuity and stability of the state's finances…"
But what he could not accept—what revolted him—were the blood-soaked, incendiary phrases André had used:
"Tax farming came into the world soaked in blood, its every pore reeking of filth and cruelty. Its legacy of plunder is etched in the annals of human history with blood and fire… This grotesque, criminal relic of feudalism must be swept away—and the tax farmers must stand before the people's tribunal to receive their righteous judgment."
Outside a room on the second floor, Bailly suddenly stopped in his tracks. He turned to a soldier standing guard with a musket slung across his back and asked, "Is the commander still asleep in there?"
Since July of 1789, Lafayette had served as commander of the Paris National Guard, and by October, he had been elevated to supreme commander of all National Guard forces across France. But that was only on paper—he could scarcely command any real authority over the provincial militias.
The soldier smiled and nodded, stepping aside respectfully.
Without knocking—a most un-gentlemanly breach—Bailly stormed inside and shook the still-slumbering commander awake.
"What now? Another riot? Who's storming what this time?" Lafayette asked groggily, his instincts still caught between dreams and duty. Since assuming his post as commander of the Paris militia, such rude awakenings had become routine. It was always the same story: the sans-culottes, goaded by some schemer, were either killing officials or laying siege to the palace.
"Not yet," Bailly replied, his voice tight. "But it won't be long." He proceeded to recount what had just happened at the public notice board. "This lawyer—André-Franck—is out of control. The Palais de Justice and the National Assembly have apparently aligned with him, bypassing the Hôtel de Ville entirely. They're endorsing his dangerous rhetoric. It's a disgrace to law and a threat to order."
Lafayette, now awake and somewhat refreshed after a quick wash and a glass of water, regained his usual aristocratic poise and dash. He frowned and listened intently, but this time, he did not immediately side with his old friend.
With a tone of polite apology, Lafayette explained, "My friend, the article in question was actually brought to my attention yesterday afternoon. I gave my consent. I had meant to inform you, but your secretary told me you'd gone off to the Academy library—to respond, I presume, to those astronomical queries from the students at Lycée Louis-le-Grand."
"In any case," Lafayette added, "I believe, as do our colleagues at the Palais and the Assembly, that this lawyer—André—has incited no violence. His article simply calls for the abolition of tax farming and for legal prosecution of tax farmers who have diverted national revenue into their own pockets."
Of course, what Lafayette did not mention was the very real and persuasive financial incentive: those two dozen tax farmers being accused would be required to return at least half of the stolen revenue—estimated between sixty million and a hundred million livres. Both the Paris Police Prefecture and the National Guard stood to gain a handsome share.
And Lafayette needed that money—badly. He was planning a full restructuring of the Paris National Guard. The goal was to take the messy, ill-equipped local militias and forge them into a modern, battle-ready force of 14,000 men—one that could rival even the disciplined German regiments under his cousin, the Marquis de Bouillé, garrisoned at Metz.
Unlike left-wing deputies who shouted slogans and crudely demanded the heads of every tax farmer, André had taken a more subtle path. He had made quiet arrangements through the Palais de Justice, striking deals with the Tax Committee of the Assembly and even the Hôtel de Ville itself. It was a shared crime disguised as reform—a tripartite carve-up of funds not yet reclaimed.
In André's own words, borrowed from a madman of the next century:
"There are only two things that truly unite people—shared ideals and shared crimes."
He had deliberately bypassed Mayor Bailly in favor of Lafayette, whom he—truthfully—did not admire either. But Bailly's close friendship with Lavoisier (himself a tax farmer and generous patron of the Academy) made the mayor a liability. Many of the tax farmers were regular donors to the Académie des Sciences, offering annual sums of over 100,000 livres.
Lafayette looked at the downcast academic and spoke in a lowered voice, "This lawyer—André, though he prefers to be called André—assures me the new tribunal he's proposed won't be criminal in nature. It's meant to be a special tax court, not a revolutionary tribunal."
In other words, they wanted money, not heads. The goal was restitution, not retribution. The idea was to strip the tax farmers of their wealth, not their lives.
"When did André become a judge? Or a prosecutor, for that matter?" Bailly snapped, incredulous. "He's just a junior lawyer from the Palais. How does he have this much power? Is he a moderate or a radical?"
Lafayette laughed. "Ah, my friend, his talent is considerable. One might even say he's a born politician—perhaps touched by divine favor. Don't look at me like that. I speak from experience. I saw it myself in Versailles last October."
"Just this year," he went on, "André defended a violent agitator from the provinces—and in the process, managed to have Marat, Hébert, and their ilk driven out of Paris. He took over the Cordeliers Club and aligned it with the city's police. He comes from the Palais de Justice, yet already has allies in the Assembly. I didn't like him at first, but I can't ignore him anymore."
"As for his faction…" Lafayette paused to think. "Well, he reminds me of Mirabeau—disregarding moral posturing, always toeing the edge of legality, a man of two faces: one noble, one base. The difference is, André is younger, handsomer, and writes better poetry. That poem of his—'If Life Deceives You'—has practically bewitched my two nieces."
To compare a promising young man to Mirabeau—this was no trivial matter. Nor was Lafayette the only one fond of making such comparisons. Among Parisian elites, it had become a fashionable habit.
For his part, Count Mirabeau himself rarely deigned to comment on such gossip. He would simply scoff and dismiss it with a wave of his hand.
But in the great marble hall of the École Militaire—the temporary seat of the National Constituent Assembly—during the noontime recess, Mirabeau let his temper slip.
Swinging one of his great, hairy arms, he grumbled to Bishop Talleyrand of Autun, "That bastard from Reims again! Even last night, while I was—shall we say—entertaining the Marquise de Norelle, she wouldn't shut up about him. She kept moaning his name while quoting his poetry—mid-climax, no less!"
Talleyrand, ever composed, didn't bat an eye at the Count's vulgarity. Leaning on his cane, he merely scanned the bustling hall with caution and replied in a low voice:
"Your Excellency, that bastard—as you call him—is practically your pupil. He sat through eleven of your speeches in the debate chamber."
"Eleven!" Mirabeau corrected with pride. "And once, from the gallery no less, I annihilated that banker Necker. I had my eye on that boy from Reims even then—and on Robespierre too. But I never expected André to climb so fast."
Talleyrand nodded with a knowing smile. "Indeed. That boy has rallied all the most unruly elements in the Assembly. I wouldn't be surprised if a motion about the tax farming system passes within the next few days."
Mirabeau shot him a sideways glance. "And will you support it, or oppose it?"
"I make it a habit to side with the victors," Talleyrand answered smoothly.
"You sly bastard."
"A poor, crippled, sly bastard," the bishop replied with a half-smile.
Mirabeau burst out laughing, just as the session chair began furiously ringing the brass bell—a signal that recess was over and the debate chamber was about to be sealed once more.
As dusk approached, the gardens of the Palais-Royal were still teeming with life. The circular arcades bustled with shops, their evening business lively and loud. Men and women strolled in pairs, weaving between the blooming marguerites—French daisies—in full spring color. The stockbrokers, weary from a day of shouting on the exchange floor, loosened their neckties and allowed themselves to appreciate the young ladies now clad in thin summer frocks. Street hawkers passed by the prostitutes, sometimes helping themselves to an illicit grope. The women would squeal—half in protest, half for effect—drawing amused whistles from nearby café-goers.
It was the loveliest kind of Parisian afternoon in spring. Every plant seemed to exhale perfume into the air, and every bird—whether perched high in the trees or flitting through the hedges—sang a song in praise of love.
Standing on the balcony of the main building, the Duke of Orléans took it all in with quiet delight. He let the golden light wash over his face, basking in it like a chosen servant of God, drinking in the cheers of the crowd below as if they were a divine chorus.
He stood there for quite some time. Only when his valet knocked politely at the door did the Duke return from his reverie.
It was Laclos—his secretary, his shadow, and his most loyal hound.
Upon entering, Laclos heard the Duke say the words he'd been dreaming aloud:
"One day, I want to stand atop the steps of the Tuileries and receive the people's ovation. Louis XVI is not worthy of the crown of France."
Only before the ever-faithful Laclos would the Duke dare voice such ambitions.
"No, Your Highness," Laclos replied, carefully modulating his tone. "Versailles is what suits you—not the cramped, dull Tuileries. That place is too small to hold your greatness."
Eight years earlier, Laclos had met the Duke quite by chance—but from that moment on, he had dedicated himself fully to the Orléans cause. Behind many of the most scandalous events of the past decade, his fingerprints could be found:
In 1785, it was Laclos who maneuvered the Diamond Necklace Affair to ruin Queen Marie Antoinette's reputation.In 1787, he persuaded the Duke to openly support the Palais de Justice against the Versailles court.In 1789, he urged the Duke to renounce his status as a second-estate noble and join the Third Estate in the Estates-General.That same July, it was Laclos who encouraged Camille Desmoulins to incite the crowd that stormed the Bastille.
Each plot had been one of Laclos's masterstrokes.
His next plan had been grander still: When the mob of Parisian women stormed Versailles in October, they were to kill Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette amidst the chaos. In the aftermath, the Duke would declare himself Regent of France and restore order in the capital.
But the plan went awry. The Duke had let slip his intentions to a mistress, who, in her vanity, boasted of it to anyone who would listen. The result: Lafayette's National Guard mobilized ahead of schedule and saved the royal family, crushing the opportunity before it could blossom.
One misstep led to another.
Lafayette, though he refrained from punishing the Duke outright—for the sake of peace—privately conspired with Mirabeau and Talleyrand to exile Orléans under the guise of a diplomatic mission to England. Despite Laclos's protests, the Duke had caved to pressure and accepted the role of royal envoy.
When the Duke returned to Paris in early 1790, he found that his years of goodwill had vanished like mist. The aristocracy continued to sneer at the king's cousin, seeing him as a pandering, spineless traitor to their class. Even the deputies in the Assembly looked down on him, believing he had fled the revolution out of cowardice. As for the Brabante crown that Lafayette had privately promised him? A mirage.
The Duke's hairline had retreated several inches in grief—but Laclos remained ever loyal. Quietly, he worked to restore his master's reputation among all classes in Paris.
"Earlier this afternoon," the Duke said, "Paulze and two of the tax farmers came to see me. I claimed to be unwell and declined to meet them—but they left this." He opened a drawer and produced a check for 100,000 livres.
Laclos chuckled, tapping the amount with one finger. "One hundred thousand is far too little. They'll need to offer sixty million—maybe a full hundred million—before His Highness even considers lifting a finger for them."
"A hundred million?" the Duke gasped. "Can they even afford that?"
"More than enough," Laclos replied smoothly. "André and I calculated the amount ourselves in the Palais. It'll sting—badly—but it won't bankrupt them. The vampires will still have blood left."
"André," the Duke repeated the name aloud, turning it over like a coin in his mouth. "André-Franck… Would he be willing to pledge the same loyalty to me that Danton once offered?"
"For now, we simply have an arrangement—mutual assistance," Laclos clarified. In truth, even Danton had never sworn any loyalty to the Duke, whether in public or in private.
After all, it was far more fashionable for lawyers to profess loyalty to the Constitution and the Rule of Law.
In his heart, the Duke harbored no fondness for lawyers. He found them even more repugnant than prostitutes—at least the latter would lie down for a price. Lawyers, by contrast, wrapped every demand in a shroud of legality, dragging out every affair with their maddening "due process."
Still, hatred aside, he needed them—especially the clever, ambitious ones. Laclos had made it clear: André held no love for Louis XVI. The young lawyer had once said,
"On that day in Versailles, when the King refused to mount his horse, he lost my loyalty forever."
With that, the Duke picked up the check and handed it to Laclos.
"Give it to André. Tell him it's a token of my congratulations—for his victory tomorrow in court."
The sound of rustling echoed through the attic: "Swish... swish... swish..." After dinner, André had secluded himself upstairs, unable to stop running his fingers over the paper check in his hands. Again and again, he let the stiff vellum glide between his fingers just to hear the crisp, musical rhythm it made—one more time, one more time.
Yes, this charming little darling was none other than the bank note personally delivered by Laclos, the ever-loyal servant of the Duke of Orléans.
"One hundred thousand livres!" André whispered with genuine reverence. "The Duke is truly generous—far more so than Marat ever was. Such a pity… the balding Duke simply lacks the nerve. He longs for greatness, yet shrinks from the fire. If only he dared to reach into the flames, he might truly be a master worth serving."
Even in Europe, André thought, a throne must be seized with blood and bone. Only the resolute, the daring, and the lucky—those in step with history—ever earned the crown. Henry IV had done it. Louis XIV had worn it with pride. Napoleon would, one day, seize it outright. But the Duke of Orléans, that petty schemer, simply wasn't made of the same steel.
Still—one hundred thousand livres was only the first payment. More would surely follow. With this, André could sleep well. If the skies turned tomorrow, he would have the means to vanish without a trace.
Just as he tucked the check away, he heard the hurried footsteps of Meldar thundering up the attic stairs.
The boy's voice came even faster than his feet.
"Monsieur André! Bad people are coming—it's the tax farmers!" Meldar wheezed. "But Sergeant Hoche stopped them at the door!"
André gave a small nod and calmly reached under the bed to pull out a leather case. From it, he drew two dueling pistols and slipped them into his belt before throwing on a coat to cover the weapons. The guns had been procured by Legendre, purely for self-defense.
Before descending the stairs, André turned to the Polish boy and said firmly, "You and your aunt stay in your room. No matter what happens downstairs, you do not come down."
"Poles are no cowards," Meldar muttered, bristling with pride, and quickly followed André.
By the time they reached the entry hall, André exhaled in relief. The unexpected visitor was not a thug, but a familiar face: the radiant Madame Lavoisier herself. Her two liveried coachmen had been stopped outside by Sergeant Hoche, who had no intention of letting them inside.
Relieved that the tax farmers had not dared barge in with torches and blades, André addressed her curtly.
"If Madame has something to say, speak it here. I am busy preparing for tomorrow's hearing."
The lady bit her lip and clenched her silver-tipped cane. Rage simmered in her eyes. It was this man—this smug little upstart—who had launched an entire city into political frenzy.
Almost overnight, André's fiery manifesto against the tax farmers and their corrupt system had blanketed Paris. From the Hôtel de Ville to the National Assembly, from parks to post offices, from cafés to parade grounds, everywhere one turned, his words roared from posters and proclamations.
The city's newspapers—nearly all of them—had joined in the chorus. A few dared defend the old system, but angry mobs quickly surrounded those presses, hurled waste at their doors, and forced them to shut down for days.
The police, for their part, looked the other way. According to the Declaration of the Rights of Man, the people had a right to express political opinion—so long as no weapons were drawn, and no violence incited. After all, a little urine and feces never hurt anyone. (It was worth remembering that before 1865, Paris still had no public toilets—not even at the Palais de Justice or the Opera.)
The tax farmers were not taking this lying down. One after another, they had tried to call in favors from past beneficiaries—but none answered. At the Palais, at the Hôtel de Ville, from judges to prosecutors, even Mayor Bailly—none would see them.
In the Assembly, those who spoke in defense of the system were met with boos. Some had their speaking rights stripped.
At the Academy of Sciences, a few faint voices spoke on their behalf—Condorcet, Legendre, Monge—but their protests were too soft to be heard.
And at the Tuileries, though the King and Queen sympathized, they were too terrified of the mobs to lift a finger.
Carriages bearing the tax farmers were regularly blocked by hecklers. Rotten vegetables became a daily hazard. Even Madame Lavoisier herself had arrived tonight in an unmarked, shabby cab—one usually reserved for servants.
She cut straight to the point.
"The Châtelet Criminal Court will reduce Babeuf's charge to manslaughter. He will be sentenced to two year. You will receive thirty thousand livres in compensation."
André was disgusted by her arrogance. He answered with righteous clarity:
"Madame, you are not the prosecutor in this case. You have no standing to negotiate with me. Let me make myself perfectly clear: the great and virtuous André is not for sale. No amount of livres can purchase my integrity. Now kindly leave."
She snapped. "You will lose in court tomorrow!" she screamed, fury pouring out in waves. The past days had frayed her nerves to the breaking point.
André merely shrugged, his face calm and amused. At this stage, he knew the Babeuf case was merely a pretext. Even if his client were sentenced to death, his own reputation would remain intact—if not enhanced. Tomorrow, a secret weapon would be unveiled in court.
Outside, the coachmen and footmen tried to storm the door in defense of their mistress. But Sergeant Hoche swiftly knocked them down with three well-placed blows. Across the street, a patrol officer ran over, waving his handcuffs with theatrical flourish, swearing to André that he'd have the thugs locked up immediately.
André tossed him a silver livre.
"No need," he said, granting tacit permission for the lady to retreat.
By now, Madame Lavoisier's painted face had gone pale. She climbed back into the shabby coach. Her servants scrambled up behind her, and the carriage disappeared into the night.
"Twenty thousand livres!" Meldar exclaimed from the stairwell. "How much money is that?"
He tried to count with his fingers, but quickly gave up. Of course, a just man like Monsieur André would never accept such a bribe.
The boy had no idea that, tucked inside the desk drawer in the attic, his righteous hero had only hours earlier slipped away a check worth five times that amount.