Chapter 232 Abyss

Chapter 233 Abyss

A skinny old man in a thin linen coat, pulling a sallow-faced and skinny ten-year-old child, squeezed in front of the granary official with difficulty, lowered his head, and stroked his chest and said:

"Master, kind master! Bread in the city is sold at 22 sous per pound, we really can't afford it... Please be kind and send some food! Otherwise, we really can't survive!"

Generally speaking, bread in Nice does not exceed 10 sous per pound. For the citizens who barely make a living by pinching every sou of wages, this means that they will have no money to buy food for more than half a month.

Immediately, waves of pleading sounded around:

"Please distribute affordable food! His Majesty the King said in the notice..."

"The child has only eaten one meal in the past two days, please!"

"Master, many bakeries in the city have no flour, and everyone is counting on the reserve food..."

"For God's sake, have mercy on us..."

The granary official just said perfunctorily helplessly.

In the crowd, a man with three moles on his face sneered and nodded to the twenty people beside him. The scarred man in the lead immediately strode towards the granary guards and shouted:

"We can't starve to death, go get the food ourselves!"

His accomplices immediately followed suit and shouted:

"We have the right to get bread!"

"That's right, just take some food for our families and children, God will forgive us!"

"Everyone, hurry up!"

The hungry people outside the granary were afraid to step forward when they heard this.

The scarred man had already smashed the gate of the granary wall, and a guard pointed a gun at him and shouted:

"Back off!"

Someone next to him waved and shouted at the crowd:

"Look! These brutal guards are going to shoot!"

The scarred man took advantage of the guard's moment of distraction and snatched his gun. The other guards didn't expect things to turn out like this, and after a moment of hesitation, they were surrounded by more than twenty accomplices of the scarred man.

The brave hungry people saw that Scarface had already rushed into the granary, and immediately rushed in, and then led more people.

After just over ten minutes, nearly a thousand hungry people rushed into the granary like a tide. The officials in charge saw that the guards had been beaten black and blue, and they hid in their offices and dared not come out at all.

Soon, the hungry people in the granary took out bags to pack wheat, and those who did not bring bags took off their coats and pocketed grain regardless of the severe cold.

An hour later, more than 20,000 pounds of wheat in the granary were swept away.

Most of the hungry people left the "payment" for the wheat they took away at the "people's tax" price of 2 sous and 6 deniers per pound.

The so-called "people's tax" is a "tradition" in France. People believe that as long as they pay a price they think is reasonable, it can only be considered a transaction rather than a robbery.

The officials in charge of the granary waited for the hungry people to disperse, and looked at the empty warehouse as if they were falling into an ice cave.

This place was originally used to supply food to Nice for a week, but now there is nothing. This means that all the grain stores and bakeries in the city will have to close soon...

The next day, in a wooden house in the suburbs of Nice, a man with three moles on his face counted out more than 80 silver coins to Scarface.

The latter immediately nodded and flattered him, and then distributed the money to his subordinates. He was the leader of the "Howell" gang, the largest gang in Nice.

And "Three Moles" was a spy raised by the Duke of Orleans. According to the instructions of the Duke of Orleans, he came to Nice a month ago and hired the "Howell" gang at a sky-high price of 4 livres per person per day to incite riots with him.

After a long plan, their action yesterday was a huge success.

After paying the "wages", "Three Moles" immediately led the gang members to the reserve grain warehouse to wait.

As he expected, soon there were citizens who heard the news of yesterday's grain robbery and came to try their luck, but without exception, they found that the grain warehouse had been emptied.

The scar-faced man would then come forward and tell them that everyone was going to "take" the stored food from the grain stores and bakeries in the city this afternoon.

By 3:00 p.m., Nice was already in a state of impending disaster.

As the scar-faced man led the charge into the city's largest bakery, the whole city went into a frenzy - people who had been hungry for a long time, people who were anxious about food supply, smashed the doors of grain stores and bakeries and took as much food as possible.

At first, people still followed the rules to leave "people's taxes", but in the second half, it had become a simple robbery.

By dusk, the normal bread supply in the city completely collapsed.

Those who did not grab food were destined to not be able to buy even a little bread crumbs tomorrow morning. And such people accounted for the majority of the citizens.

The next day, the door of the devastated "Markman" bakery was crowded with desperate citizens - the store owner and the chef had already run away, and there was nothing in the store. Although people knew it, they still habitually wandered here.

Just when they were in despair, Scarface walked through the street with thousands of people, and shouts came from the crowd:

"Viscount Slert's house has a lot of food, let's go ask him for some food."

"If you don't want to starve to death, come quickly!"

"There is no food in the city, don't hesitate!"

The people in front of the bakery were stunned for a moment, and immediately joined the team heading to Viscount Slert's house.

Although some people felt that Viscount Slert's family was pretty good, at this time people would just blindly follow the leader like a panicked flock of sheep, completely losing their ability to think.

Before noon, Viscount Slert's villa was robbed. Scarface, in accordance with the requirements of his "employer", led the hungry people to Baron Abela's house.

...

At the same time, in the center of Montpellier, the spies sent by the Duke of Orleans also led a large number of citizens to rob food with dozens of gang members as the core.

Just as the leading gang member called on the hungry people to rob a nobleman's house in the south of the city, a hungry person loudly suggested:

"Why don't we go to Count Sérurier's house? His manor is so big, there must be a lot of food..."

Before he finished speaking, he was secretly kicked, and two gang members pretended to squeeze him to the ground.

Count Sérurier was an ally of the Duke of Orleans, and he must be avoided from being burned. In fact, the Marquis de Saint-Veran's Montcalm Corps is currently stationed in his manor, with more than 17,000 people. Even if the hungry people go there, they will definitely be blocked outside.

The episode soon passed, and the crowd began to shout and rush to the south of the city.

In just a few days, the hungry mob has swept most of Montpellier, and the Marquis de Saint-Veran, who is responsible for the security here, just watched coldly and let the riot spread...

Because the strategic reserve grain was maliciously and randomly transferred, the reserve grain warehouses in the central and southern provinces of France have been exhausted one after another.

After Nice and Montpellier, food shortages began to gradually appear in other areas, and the spies sent by the Duke of Orleans also began to move.

However, due to the poor information transmission capabilities of this era, the news has not yet reached the Palace of Versailles.

...

Paris.

At the moment when the two guards lowered their heads to light cigarettes, Sorel flashed from behind them and slipped into the corridor on the west side of the second floor of the Royal Palace.

She leaned her back against a statue, took a deep breath, looked at the door of the document room not far away, and secretly rejoiced in her heart: I finally got in!

After the "prison break" that day, she and her fellow brothers in the Brotherhood divided the work, each responsible for investigating a suspected duke. And she focused her attention on the Duke of Orleans.

She had heard that the Duke of Orleans had recently traveled to the south, and thought it was a godsend, and it should be easy to find some useful evidence. Who knew that the Royal Palace was extremely strict, even more than the Bastille!

She came here several times, but she could only walk around the periphery. Today, she finally caught the guards' slackness and finally touched the document room.

After a team of patrol guards passed by, she quietly came to the door of the document room, took out a receiver and pressed it on the door to listen for a while, and after confirming that there was no movement inside, she skillfully pried open the door lock with wire.

She muttered to herself, "It's much easier to open than the lock of the Bastille," and pushed the door open carefully, then turned around and gently closed it.

However, when she cast her eyes on the rows of bookshelves, she was stunned - there was nothing on them!

Previously, these bookshelves were full of documents neatly arranged by time and type.

She cautiously drew out her swift sword, walked around the room, and confirmed that there was no ambush, then she breathed a sigh of relief.

Sorel left the archive room in confusion, and took great pains to sneak into the Duke of Orleans' study. She found that although the furnishings here were the same as before, there was no paper left, and even the door of the safe was open, and it was empty inside.

Then, she searched the Duke of Orleans' bedroom, conference room, etc., and also did not see any documents, archives, etc.

She was very surprised. The Duke of Orleans went on a trip without guards, but took all the documents with him?

Suddenly, her pupils shrank, and a thought came to her mind: The Duke of Orleans has fled for fear of crime! The duke that the Marlott brothers mentioned is probably him!

The more she thought about it, the more she felt that this speculation would never be wrong, so she immediately slipped out of the Royal Palace and rushed to the office of the Crown Prince overnight.

On the second floor of the Tuileries Palace, sleepy Emman looked at the clock on the table - 10 minutes past midnight.

He wanted to send this girl who had no sense of time away and asked her to come back tomorrow, but suddenly remembered the last time His Royal Highness the Crown Prince summoned her directly into his office.

He glanced at Sorel's curvy waist in a black nightgown and her straight and slender long legs, and suddenly understood something. No wonder she came so late, well, it was probably the agreed time.

Joseph was awakened from his sleep. He looked at Emmanuel with dissatisfaction and frowned:

"Sorrel? What time is it?"

However, since he was awake, he waved his hand drowsily:

"Since she said it was urgent... Well, please ask her to go to the reception room."

After a while, Joseph in his nightgown motioned Sorel to sit down opposite the sofa, yawned and said:

"What's the urgent matter that brought you here so late?"

Sorrel nodded vigorously and said seriously:

"Your Highness, I found the mastermind behind the Maletto brothers!"

"Oh?" Joseph immediately perked up, "Please tell me in detail."

Sorrel immediately recounted the story of the Brotherhood going to the Bastille to extract confessions, and the Maletto brothers accidentally saying that their boss was a duke.

"Duke?" Joseph was no longer sleepy. He pointed at Sorel and criticized him in a deep voice, "You are so brave. You dare to break into the prison. Aren't you afraid that I will put you in jail too?"

"This is all for justice..." Sorel straightened his chest, glanced at Joseph with a dark face, swallowed his saliva, and whispered, "Your Highness, you won't really let someone arrest me, will you?"

Joseph waved his hand: "Tell me about your discovery first."

"Oh, okay." Sorel continued hurriedly, "I went to search the Duke of Orleans's house, and I found that all the documents in the Royal Palace were gone..."

When she finished speaking, Joseph's face was as gloomy as water.

At this time of year, the nobles really like to travel to the south to avoid the cold. No one would care if the Duke of Orleans said he wanted to go. But he didn't expect that he actually took away all the important information. It must not be as simple as traveling.

However, he didn't think that the Duke of Orleans was "fleeing from the crime" - it was just burning a small noble to death, and he didn't do it himself. With his status, he didn't care at all.

Something big must have happened here!

Soon, Fouché was also dragged out of bed and rushed to the Bastille with His Royal Highness the Dauphin to interrogate the Marletto brothers overnight.

After getting the important clue of the Duke of Orleans, the experienced interrogators of the police department easily tricked the two brothers into confessing.

Joseph frowned as he listened to Fouché's report on the case, and couldn't help frowning:

"But why did the Duke of Orleans go to such great lengths to plot against Monod?"

He looked at the candlelight jumping on the wall and pondered:

"If the Duke of Orleans is planning a conspiracy, and Monod is an indispensable part of it, then it all makes sense..."

He suddenly turned to Fouché and said:

"Quick! Send someone to Monod's house!"

However, when the police arrived at Monod's residence in the Palace of Versailles, he was no longer there.

According to Monod's servant, he took his son to the south to "sunbathe" on the day of Sorel's prison break.

"Going to the south again?" Joseph ordered Fouche with a cold face, "Check immediately to see if anyone else has gone on a trip recently."

"Yes, Your Highness!"

Joseph analyzed what the Duke of Orleans was going to do, but he could not get the point, so he had to start from the existing breakthrough.

He asked people to wake up all the main officials of the internal affairs system and asked them to summarize all the orders issued by Monod recently.

Fortunately, most of the nobles lived in the Palace of Versailles, and these officials were basically nobles, so it was very simple to gather them.

When the first ray of sunlight in the morning shone into the Palace of Versailles, a thick pile of documents had been sorted out and piled in front of Joseph.

"Pick the main ones." Joseph looked at the assistant to the Minister of the Interior with panda eyes.

The latter hesitated and said: "Your Highness, Count Monod has not done anything important in the past two months, but... he seems to be very concerned about the transfer of grain."

The transportation and allocation of grain is originally the work of the internal affairs system, but these are usually done by the lower officials. It is a bit strange that the Minister of the Interior personally asks about these trivial matters.

Joseph narrowed his eyes and asked him to find all the transfer documents issued by Monod.

But when Joseph saw the dozens of disorganized and confusing transfer orders, he instantly became furious.

Orleans, this bastard, is going to push the whole of France into the abyss!