A few faces turned to look and Napoleon seized the moment, charging towards the middle of the body of men fighting their way towards the meeting’s speaker. He filled his lungs and shouted, ‘Death to tyranny!’

Marmont and Junot raced after him, adding their cries to his. An instant later they were amongst the royalists, slashing out with their clubs. Since they were soldiers and more accustomed to the madness of battle, and the need to strike hard and fast, they had an advantage over the casual bullies who had been expecting an unarmed crowd and not this fierce counter-attack. Napoleon thrust out again with his crutch, and struck a man’s shoulder.The blow was not disabling and the man at once swung his club at Napoleon’s head. Napoleon snatched the crutch back and up into the path of the club and there was a sharp crack, the force of the blow jarring his hands. Marmont abruptly swung his boot into the man’s crotch, hard enough to lift the royalist off his feet, and the man tumbled back with a deep groan and rolled on the ground vomiting. Marmont hissed at Napoleon, ‘Hold the other bloody end, you fool! Use it like a club.’

As he reversed his hold Napoleon heard the speaker shout out to his bodyguards. ‘Help those men! Help them!’

Napoleon, Marmont and Junot stood back to back in a loose triangle, swinging their makeshift weapons at the men about them, trying to keep them at a distance. Marmont growled, ‘Come on then, you bastards! If you have the stomach for it.’

‘Girondin scum!’ someone shouted back.

‘Girondin? Girondin!’ Marmont roared. ‘I’m a Jacobin, you bastard! And you’re dead!’

He hurled himself into their midst, knocking two of the royalists to the ground, and then he was laying about him in great sweeping arcs with his club, shattering bones, battering muscles into nerveless jelly and driving the breath from his enemies with his blows.

Junot edged closer to Napoleon. ‘They really shouldn’t have called him a Girondin. I almost feel sorry for them.’

‘No time for that,’ Napoleon replied.Taking a deep breath he moved off in Marmont’s wake. The speaker and his bodyguards joined the fight and as the royalists were forced to stop and defend themselves the crowd stopped fleeing. Some edged towards the fight and then the first of them walked, then ran, back to the melee. ‘Death to tyrants!’ he called out, then again, his voice strengthening. Others joined in, emboldened by his confidence.

Napoleon glanced back and felt his heart lift. ‘Citizens! Help us!’