Napoleon raced back to Paris and walked into the Élysée-Bourbon Palace early on the morning of 21 June. ‘The blow I have been dealt is a mortal one,’ he confided to Caulaincourt before getting into a hot bath, as he often did when he needed to collect his thoughts. He spent the next four days in a state of indecision. He eventually decided to abdicate in favour of his son, and left Paris for la Malmaison,
