All this time they remained ignorant of the fate of the Queen. They had, indeed, heard the street hawkers crying the sentence of death under their windows; but, though their hearts misgave them at times, they refused to believe that the sentence could have been actually carried out, and so hoped against hope. Whether from callous indifference or because no one had the heart to tell them, the fatal news never reached their ears, and it was eighteen months before Madame Royale knew of her mother’s death. Thus the days passed until the 9th of May, 1794. The day had been spent as usual, and the prisoners were just going to bed, when loud and continued knocking at the door and demands for immediate admission warned them of some new evil. The summons was for Madame Elizabeth. “Citizen, will you accompany us downstairs?” “And my niece?” “She shall be taken care of afterwards.” Madame Elizabeth embraced her niece, and told her, by way of reassuring her, that she would soon return. “No, citizen,” said the ruffians; “you will not return. Put on your bonnet and go downstairs.” “She bore it all with patience,” says Madame Royale, “put on her bonnet, embraced me once more, and told me to take courage and be firm, to place my hope in God, to live in the good principles of religion which my parents had taught me, and to keep constantly in my mind the last advice of my father and mother. She then departed.” The young girl of fifteen was thus left, as she herself expresses it, “in an utter state of desolation.” She “passed a cruel night”; but, though filled with fears, she could not believe that serious harm could be intended to one who was so saintly and pure, and who could never be accused of taking any share in the Government or of any political offence. She was told the next day, in answer to her inquiries, that her aunt had been to take the air. She little thought that Madame Elizabeth had even then travelled her last journey and reached her long home.