The Accountant Becomes Louis XVI to Save His Neck

The ultimatum, composed in terms of soaring, bellicose outrage by Vergennes, was dispatched to London aboard the swiftest ship that could be seized. Art knew, with dread certainty of a man reading from a well-rehearsed script, it would be met with British scorn and condescension. Official, public diplomacy was a locomotive out of control, careening towards a cliff. He despaired except to create a new set of tracks in stealth, to create a way of having a conversation that wasn't bellowed across a sea. He needed a back channel, and he knew there was only one man in Paris who could provide it.

The second surreptitious session with Benjamin Franklin once more utilized the humble home from before. Yet, in mood, it was quite altered. That first session was a blend of optimism with secrecy. This one weighed heavily with a very distinct possibility of a war they did not want, not yet.

Franklin, his worried face fixed, listened intently as Art laid out the circumstances with no preliminaries.

"Doctor, my hotheads are crying for blood," declared Art, pacing back and forth the full length of the library. "Vergennes has his casus belli, his ideal pretext for starting the war he's coveted for twenty years. That assault on the Concorde has goaded public opinion to a frenzy. I have been driven to giving an ultimatum which I know the British will refuse to abide by. I am being inexorably driven towards a full-blown war declaration." He paused and looked at the old American. "A war of which, at this moment, France is not strong enough to win, and of which your own new revolution isn't strong enough to take advantage as yet. We both need time."

Franklin slowly smiled, his sharp eyes reading the subtle and dangerous play that Art was making. "You want to de-escalate, even as your government formally escalates."

"Just so," said Art. "I must appear strong and resolute to my own subjects, particularly to the war party in my court. But privately, I must convey to sane minds in London that there is a way back from this precipice. You have men there, Doctor. Men of sense in Parliament, influential merchants of the City of London who view war as unfavorable to trade. Will you take a word to them?"

"What would be the message?" Franklin asked.

That was Art's gambit. He couldn't retract his ultimatum. But he could provide a process, a bureaucratic off-ramp that would allow both sides to save face, for tempers to subside.

"Now, here is the word," said Art, sketching out his proposal. "France ostensibly calls for justice but unofficially suggests a mechanism for its delivery that doesn't involve cannon fire. Suggest, through your back channels, the establishment of a 'Joint Commission of Inquiry' to investigate the 'unfortunate and tragic Martinique incident.' It's a perfect resolution. I can sell it to my court as a victory—we've strong-armed the British into subjecting their behavior to international inquiry. You can sell it to the British government as a reasonable, legalistic proceeding, a heck of a lot better than war. It's a committee. It will take months to organize, months more to get here, to talk with witnesses, to write reports. It's a way of burying the crisis in paper until the fever breaks."

Franklin listened, a steady smile broadening his face. He liked the blunt, cynical brilliance of the plot. It was an advanced world's favorite arsenal: red tape. "You want me to help you wrap the British lion in red tape?"

"I want you to assist me in avoiding a premature war that would be damaging to both our causes," Art corrected gently.

"I have ties to the Whig party," Franklin considered. "Men who consider this colonial war a fool's errand and would not be interested in initiating another war with France. They would be listening. I will write some letters. A commission is a tempting ideal for men who believe in due process." The back channel was cleared.

As slow, labored diplomacy began, Art was faced with the more immediate problem of Parisian mood. The war passion, day after day stoked by Vergennes' allies, was gathering strength. The people were on edge, impatient for action. If he became too slow, he would jeopardize their hard-won confidence. He would need to manage their moods, to channel their patriotic fury into a more favorable course. And for that, he would need his minister of culture.

He summoned Beaumarchais. "I have a new mission for you, Beaumarchais," said Art, "and it is an urgent one. I want you to temper Parisian passion for war. And you must not appear unpatriotic. You must not exhort men not to be angry. You must offer them a new pride to be proud of, a new strength to be strong about."

Beaumarchais's eyes came alive. An assignment which required both patriotism and delicacy was precisely the sort of dramatic challenge he savored.

"They call for a dash for glory," said Art. "I want you to make them believe that real glory lies in patience. That strength lies not in a frenzied first blow, but in a well-made, irrevocable finish blow. I want a play. Short, a one-act that can be staged in a flash. It will be patriotic in subject, but its lesson must be strategic patience."

He thought for a moment, his mind fashioning scenes and plays. "A tragedy, I believe," he declared. "The people will not be in a funny mood. Tears and vengeance they demand. We will furnish it for them, but we will decide what that vengeance shall entail."

He brought out a new masterpiece of propaganda within a week. It was an exceedingly short, blistering one-act tragedy, called Le Vœu du Matelot—The Sailor's Vow.

The play recounted how a hardy, veteran old French sailor, his leg lost in a former battle with the British at Quiberon Bay, learned of an attack upon the Concorde and his hotheaded young son was with a zeal to board a warship and charge into battle in a desire for vengeance. The play's dramatic climax, that scene which would have audiences roaring in their aisles, was when the old sailor arose to his son.

He doesn't urge his boy not to fight. He holds up a small, battered medal given him by the dead King. "You see this?" asks the old sailor, his voice thick with emotion. "That is for bravery. But bravery, my boy, is not rage. Revenge is a wild-eyed hot-head who dashes headlong into the enemy guns. Honour is a practical general who waits for the moment of strike. Our King is young, but he is sensible. He whets his blade in the forge before he uses it. A true patriot trusts his King's sense. He trains his mind, his body for the inevitable storm, not dashes headlong into a squall. Our day will come, boy. And when it comes, we shall be an avalanche, not a bouldering rockfall. That is my word. Carve it in your mind. Make it your own."

The play burst into production in a score of Parisian theatres. It was an overnight, sensational success. It gave the people everything they wanted. It was fiercely anti-British. It reveled in the courage of the French sailor. It threatened a great, inevitable reprisal. But its fundamental argument was a masterpiece of psychological insight. It preached patience and preparation as ultimate patriots' mantras. It transformed the King's cautious strategy into not timidity, but profound, shrewd strength. It gave the people an outlet for turning their wrath into a proud, simmering resolve, rather than calling for an immediate, suicidal conflict.

The HUD observed this minor but significant shift in the mood of the populace.

Public Opinion: Support for Immediate War -15%.

Public Opinion: Support for "Strategic Patience" +20%.

Personal Authority: +5% (Perceived as "Wise and Prudent").

The art of Art had done it again. He'd exploited the stage to manage a entire city's feelings, buying for himself more time that was priceless. He fought a two-fronts war: a diplomatic minuet amidst dark shadows of London, a dramatic false advance amidst Paris' footlights, lest he prevent a war his council was desperately trying to start.