the great man's favourite phrase.
However, at that moment a servant entered and told Rougon that a
gentleman and a lady wished to see him. And he handed him a card, at
the sight of which Rougon uttered a slight cry. 'What! Are they in
Paris?'
The visitors were the Marquis and Marchioness d'Escorailles. Rougon
hastened to receive them in his study. They apologised for the lateness
of their visit; and, in the course of conversation, gave him to
understand that they had been in Paris for a couple of days past, but
had feared lest a visit from them to one so closely connected with
the Emperor might be misconstrued; hence they had preferred to make
their call quite privately and at this somewhat unseemly hour. The
explanation in no way offended Rougon. The presence of the Marquis
and Marchioness under his roof was an unhoped-for honour. If the
Emperor himself had knocked at his door, he would not have felt more
gratification. Those old people coming to ask a favour of him typified
all Plassans offering him its homage; that aristocratic, cold and
haughty Plassans, which had ever seemed to him a sort of inaccessible
Olympus. An old ambitious dream was at last being realised, and he felt
that he was avenged for the scorn shown him by the little town when,
as a briefless advocate, he had dragged his worn-down boots about its
ill-paved streets.
'We did not find Jules at home,' said the Marchioness d'Escorailles.
'We were looking forward with pleasure to giving him a surprise. But he
has been obliged to go to Orleans on business, it seems.'
Rougon was not aware of the young man's absence; however, he quite
understood it on recalling the circumstance that the aunt whom Madame
Bouchard had gone to see lived at Orleans. Nevertheless he justified
Jules, saying that it was a serious matter, a question of abuse of
power, which had necessitated his journey. Then he told them that their
son was a very intelligent young man and had a great future before him.
'It is necessary for him to make his way,' said the Marquis, thus
lightly alluding to the ruin of the family. 'It was a great trial to us
to part with him.'
Then he and his wife in discreet fashion began to deplore the
necessities of those degenerate times which prevented sons from growing
up in the faith of their parents. They themselves had never set foot in
Paris since the fall of Charles X.; and they would not have come there
now if it had not been a question of Jules's future. Since their dear
boy, with their secret consent, had taken service under the Empire,
they had pretended to deny him before the world, but in reality they
were continually striving for his advancement.
'We make no pretence with you, Monsieur Rougon,' said the Marquis, in
a tone of charming familiarity. 'We love our boy; it is natural we
should. You have done a great deal for him already, and we thank you
heartily for it. But we want you to do more still. We are friends and
fellow-townsmen, are we not?'
Rougon bowed, feeling much moved. The humble demeanour of those old
people whom he had seen so majestic when they repaired on Sundays to
the church of Saint Marc, seemed to enhance his own importance. He gave
them formal promises of help.
As they were going off, after twenty minutes' friendly conversation,
the Marchioness took Rougon's hand and held it for a moment within
her own. 'Then we may rely upon you, dear Monsieur Rougon?' she said.
'We came from Plassans especially for this purpose. We were beginning
to feel a little impatient. At our age you can't wonder at it. Now,
however, we shall go back feeling very happy. People told us there that
you could no longer do anything.'
Rougon smiled. And with an air of decision that seemed prompted by some
secret thoughts of his own, he replied: 'Where there's a will there's a
way; rely on me.'
When they had left him, however, a shadow of regret passed over
his face. He was still tarrying in the ante-room, when he espied a
neatly-dressed man, who, balancing a small round felt hat between his
fingers, stood in a respectful attitude in a corner.
'What do you want?' Rougon curtly asked him.
The man, who was very tall and broad-shouldered, lowered his eyes and
replied: 'Don't you recognise me, sir?' And as Rougon declared that he
did not, the other continued, 'I'm Merle, your old usher at the Council
of State.'
At this Rougon became somewhat softer: 'Oh, yes! But you are wearing a
full beard now. Well, my man, what do you want me to do for you?'
Then Merle proceeded to explain matters in studiously polite language.
He had met Madame Correur in the afternoon, and she had advised him to
see Monsieur Rougon that very evening. If it had not been for that,
he, Merle, would never have presumed to disturb him at such an hour.
'Madame Correur is extremely kind,' he repeated several times. Then he
went on to say that he was out of employment. If he now wore a full
beard it was because he had left the Council of State some six months
previously. When Rougon inquired the reason of his dismissal, he would
not allow that he had been discharged for bad conduct, but bit his lip
and said: 'They all knew there how devoted I was to you, sir. After you
went away, I had to put up with all sorts of unpleasantness, because
I have never been able to conceal my real feelings. One day I almost
struck a fellow-servant who was saying provoking things, and then they
discharged me.'
Rougon looked at him searchingly. 'And so, my man, it's on my account
that you are now out of place?'
Merle smiled slightly.
'And I owe you another berth, eh? You want me to find you a situation
somewhere?'
'It would be very kind of you, sir.'
There was a short pause. Rougon tapped his hands together in a fidgety,
mechanical way. But soon he began to smile, having made up his mind. He
had too many debts; he must pay them and get rid of them.
'Well, I will look after you,' he said, 'and get you a place somewhere.
You did right to come to me, my man.'
Then he dismissed him. He now hesitated no longer. He went straight
into the dining-room where Gilquin had just finished off a pot of
jam, after eating a slice of _pâté_, the leg of a fowl, and some
cold potatoes. Du Poizat, who had joined him, was sitting astride
a chair and talking to him. They were discussing women in somewhat
crude language. Gilquin had kept his hat on his head, and leant back,
lounging in his chair and picking his teeth, under the impression that
he was behaving in proper aristocratic style.
'Well, I must be off now,' he said, after gulping down the contents of
his glass, which was full, and smacking his lips. 'I am going to the
Rue Montmartre to see what has become of my birds.'
Rougon, who seemed in high spirits, began, however, to joke at him. Now
that he had dined, did he still believe in that story of a plot? Du
Poizat, too, affected complete incredulity. He made an appointment for
the next morning with Gilquin, to whom, he said, he owed a breakfast.
Gilquin, with his cane under his arm, asked as soon as he could get a
word in: 'Then you are not going to warn----'
'Yes, I am, of course,' Rougon replied. 'But they'll merely laugh
at me. In any case there's no hurry. There will be plenty of time
to-morrow morning.'
The ex-commercial traveller had already got his hand upon the handle of
the door. However, he stepped back with a grin on his face. 'For all I
care,' he said, 'they may blow Badinguet to smithereens.'
'Oh!' replied the great man, with an air of almost religious
conviction, 'the Emperor has no cause for fear, even if your story is
correct. These plots never succeed. There is a watchful Providence.'
That was the last word spoken on the matter. Du Poizat went off with
Gilquin, chatting with him familiarly. An hour later, at half-past ten,
when Rougon shook hands with M. Bouchard and the colonel as they took
their leave, he stretched his arms and yawned, saying, as was often his
wont: 'I am quite tired out. I shall sleep well to-night.'
On the following evening three bombs exploded beneath the Emperor's
carriage in front of the Opera-house. A wild panic seized the serried
crowd blocking up the Rue Le Peletier.[15] More than fifty people
were struck. A woman in a blue silk dress was killed on the spot and
stretched stark in the gutter. Two soldiers lay dying on the road. An
aide-de-camp, wounded in the neck, left drops of blood behind him.
But, under the crude glare of the gas, amidst the wreathing smoke, the
Emperor descended unhurt from his riddled carriage, and saluted the
throng. Only his hat was torn by a splinter from one of the bombs.
Rougon had spent the day at home. In the morning he had certainly
felt a little restless, and had twice been on the point of going
out. However, just as he was finishing _déjeuner_, Clorinde made her
appearance; and then, in her society, in his study, where they remained
till evening, he forgot everything. She had come to consult him on a
matter of great intricacy, and appeared extremely discouraged. She
could succeed in nothing, she said. But Rougon began to console her,
seemingly much touched by her sadness. He gave her to understand that
there was great reason for hope, and that things would altogether
change. He was by no means ignorant of the devotion of his friends, and
of all that they had done for him, and would make it his care to reward
them, even the humblest of them. When Clorinde left him, he kissed
her on the forehead. Then after dinner he had an irresistible longing
for a walk. He left the house and took the shortest way to the quays,
feeling suffocated and craving for the fresh breezes of the river.
It was a mild winter evening, and the low, cloudy sky hung over the
city in silent blackness. In the distance the rumbling traffic of the
main streets could be faintly heard. Rougon walked along the deserted
footways with a regular step, brushing the stone parapet with his
overcoat. The lights which spread out in the far distance, twinkling
through the darkness like stars that marked the boundaries of some
dead heaven, brought him a sensation of the spreading magnitude of all
those squares and streets, whose houses were now quite invisible. As
he walked along Paris seemed to grow bigger, to expand more in harmony
with his own huge form, and to be capable of giving him all the air
he needed to inflate his lungs. From the inky river, flecked here and
there with shimmering gold, there rose a gentle yet mighty breathing,
like that of a sleeping giant--fit accompaniment to his colossal dream.
Then as he came in front of the Palais de Justice, a clock struck
the hour of nine. There was a tremulous throbbing in the air, and he
turned to listen. Over the house-tops he fancied he could hear the
sounds of a sudden panic, distant reports like those of explosions, and
cries of terror. He suddenly pictured Paris in all the stupor born of
some great crime. Then he called to mind that afternoon in June, that
bright triumphant afternoon of the Baptism, when the bells had pealed
out in the hot sunshine, and the quays had been filled with a serried
multitude, when everything had told of the glory of the Empire at its
apogee, that glory beneath which he had for a moment felt crushed and
almost jealous of the Emperor. Now he seemed to be having his revenge.
The sky was black and moonless; the city was terror-stricken and dumb;
the quays were deserted and swept by a shudder which seemed to scare
the very gas-lights, as though some weird evil lay in ambush, yonder,
in the darkness of the night. Rougon drew in long breaths of air, and
felt that he loved that cut-throat Paris, in whose terror-striking
gloom he was regaining supreme power.
Ten days later, he became Minister of the Interior, in the place of M.
de Marsy, who was called to the Presidency of the Corps Législatif.
IX
IN OFFICE
One morning in March, Rougon sat in his room at the Ministry of the
Interior, drawing up a confidential circular which was to be received
by the prefects on the following day. He kept stopping, and puffing,
and dashing his pen into the paper. 'Jules, give me a synonym for
authority,' he said. 'This language of ours is horrid. I keep putting
authority in every line.'
'Well, there's power, government, empire,' the young man answered with
a smile.
M. Jules d'Escorailles, whom Rougon had appointed his secretary,
was opening the ministerial correspondence at a corner of the
writing-table. He carefully cut the envelopes with a penknife, glanced
over the letters and then classified them. Meantime, the colonel, M.
Kahn and M. Béjuin sat in front of the grate where a large fire was
burning. They were all three reclining in their chairs and toasting
their feet in silence. M. Kahn read a newspaper, but the two others
placidly twiddled their thumbs and looked at the flames.
All at once Rougon rose from his chair, poured out a glassful of water
at a side table, and gulped it down at a draught. 'I don't know what I
can have eaten yesterday,' he said, 'but I feel as though I could drink
the Seine dry this morning.'
He did not immediately resume his seat, but began to pace the room
and stretch his burly frame. His heavy step shook the parqueterie
underneath the thick carpet. He drew back the green velvet window
curtains to let in more light, and then, coming back to the middle of
the room, which displayed the gloomy, faded magnificence of some palace
turned into a lodging-house, he remained there with his hands clasped
behind his neck, revelling, as it were, in the official perfume,
the odour of power which he inhaled there. He even broke into an
involuntary laugh, which grew louder and louder as it pealed forth his
sense of triumph. The colonel and the others turned upon hearing this
outburst of gaiety, and questioned him with their eyes.
'Ah! it's very nice, all the same,' were the only words he would say.
However, as he sat down again at the huge rosewood writing-table, Merle
came into the room. The usher was irreproachably dressed in black, with
a white tie. Not a hair remained upon his dignified face. He was again
clean-shaven.
'I beg your excellency's pardon,' he said, 'but the prefect of the
Somme----'
'Tell him to go to the deuce! I'm busy,' Rougon answered roughly.
'It's quite preposterous that I am never to be allowed a moment to
myself.'
Merle seemed in no way disconcerted, however. 'The prefect,' he
resumed, 'says that your excellency is expecting him. There are also
the prefects of the Nièvre, the Cher, and the Jura.'
'Well, let them wait! That's what they're made for,' rejoined Rougon
loudly.
The usher left the room. M. d'Escorailles had broken into a smile;
while the others who were warming themselves at the fire lolled back
more freely than ever in their chairs, and seemed amused by the
minister's reply. He was flattered by his success.
'It is true,' he said, 'that I have been going through the prefects for
the last month. It was necessary that I should have them all here. A
nice lot they are, too; some rare stupids amongst them. However, they
are very obedient. But I feel that I have had enough of them. And,
besides, it's for their benefit that I'm working this morning.'
Then he turned to his circular again. The warm silence of the room was
only broken by the scratching of his quill-pen and the slight rustling
of the envelopes which M. d'Escorailles opened. M. Kahn had taken up
another newspaper, and the colonel and M. Béjuin were half asleep.
Outside, France was hushed in fear. The Emperor, in summoning Rougon to
power, had been desirous of making examples. He knew the great man's
iron hand, and had said to him on the morning after the attempt on his
life, with all the anger of one who has just escaped assassination, 'No
moderation, mind! They must be made to fear you.' He had just armed
him, too, with that terrible Law of General Safety, which authorised
the confinement in Algeria or the expulsion from the empire of anyone
who might be convicted of a political offence. Although no single
Frenchman had taken part in the crime of the Rue Le Peletier, the
Republicans were about to be hunted down and transported; there was
to be a general sweeping away of the ten thousand 'suspects' who had
been passed over at the time of the _coup d'état_. There were rumours
of contemplated action by the revolutionary party. The authorities
were said to have made a seizure of weapons and treasonable documents.
Already in the middle of March, three hundred and eighty persons
had been shipped at Toulon for Algeria, and now every week a fresh
contingent was sent off. The whole country trembled in the terror
which like a black storm-cloud rolled forth from the room with the
green velvet curtains where Rougon laughed aloud while stretching his
arms.
The great man had never before tasted such complete contentment. He
felt well and strong, and was putting on flesh. Health had come back to
him with his return to power. When he walked about the room he dug his
heels into the carpet, as though he wanted his heavy tread to resound
throughout France. He would have liked to shake the country by merely
putting his empty glass down on the side-table or casting aside his
pen. It delighted him to be a source of fear, to forge thunderbolts
amidst the smiling gratification of his friends, and to crush a whole
nation with his swollen parvenu fists. In one of his circulars he had
written: 'It is for the good to feel confidence, and for the wicked
only to tremble.' He revelled in playing this part of a divinity,
damning some, and saving others. He was filled with mighty pride; his
idolatry of his own strength and intelligence was becoming a real
religion with him.
Among the new men who had sprung up with the Second Empire, Rougon had
long been known as a partisan of strong government. His name was a
synonym for stern repression, the refusal of all liberties; despotic
rule, in fact. All knew therefore what they had to expect when they
saw him called to office. To his intimate friends, however, Rougon
unbosomed himself. He did not, he said, so much hold opinions as feel a
craving for power. Power had too much attraction for him, and was too
essential to his appetite for him to refuse it, whatever the conditions
on which it might be offered to him.
To rule, to set his foot on the neck of the crowd, was his first and
immediate ambition; the rest was merely secondary matter to which he
could easily accommodate himself. The one thing which he really wanted
was to be chief. It so happened, however, that the circumstances under
which he was now returning to power made his success very pleasant.
The Emperor had given him complete liberty of action, and he was at
last in a position to realise his old dream of driving the multitude
with a whip like a herd of cattle. Nothing filled him with greater
satisfaction than to know that he was feared and disliked. And
sometimes when his friends told him that he was a tyrant, he smiled,
and said with deep meaning: 'If I should become a liberal some day,
people will say that I have changed.'
Rougon's very greatest joy was to stand triumphant amidst those friends
of his. He forgot France and the obsequious functionaries and the
crowd of petitioners who besieged his doors, to regale himself with
the perpetual admiration of his ten or twelve intimate associates. His
office was open to them at any hour, he allowed them to make it a home,
to take possession of his chairs, and even of his desk itself; he told
them that it was a pleasure to have them always about him like a pack
of faithful dogs. It was not he alone, but the whole coterie, that was
the minister. The bonds between them seemed to be drawn closer now that
success had come, and Rougon began to love his followers with a jealous
love, keeping them in constant communion with him, feeling as if his
greatness were increased by their several ambitions. He forgot his
secret contempt for them, and began to consider them very intelligent
and able, similar to himself. He particularly desired, moreover, that
he himself should be respected in their persons, and defended them
passionately as he might have defended the fingers of his hands. He
made their quarrels his own, and, smiling at the recollection of their
long endeavours on his behalf, he even ended by believing that he was
greatly indebted to them. Desiring nothing for himself, he lavished
upon them all the fruits of office, indulging to repletion in the
pleasure of enhancing the brilliancy of his fortune by thus scattering
the gifts at his disposal.
However, the big warm room remained silent for some time. Then M.
d'Escorailles, after glancing at the address on one of the envelopes
before him, handed it to Rougon without opening it. 'Here is a letter
from my father,' he said.
Writing in a strain of excessive humility, the Marquis thanked the
minister for having appointed Jules to be his secretary. There were two
pages of fine writing which Rougon carefully read. Then he folded the
letter and slipped it into his pocket. And before turning to his work
again he asked: 'Hasn't Du Poizat written?'
'Yes, sir,' answered the secretary, picking a letter out from among
the others. 'He is beginning to find his way about in his prefecture.
He says that Deux-Sèvres, and the town of Niort in particular, want
guiding with a firm hand.'
Rougon glanced over the letter, and remarked: 'Certainly; he shall
have all the authority he requires. There is no occasion to send him
any reply. My circular will be sufficient.'
Then he took up his pen again, and cudgelled his brains for some
suitable concluding sentences. Du Poizat had particularly wished to be
prefect at Niort, in his own native district, and the minister, when
taking any important decision, invariably thought of the department
of Deux-Sèvres, and governed France in accordance with the opinions
and necessities of his old comrade in poverty. Just as he was at last
finishing his circular to the prefects, something seemed to irritate M.
Kahn.
'It is abominable!' the latter exclaimed; and, rapping the newspaper
he was reading, he turned to Rougon, and cried: 'Have you read this?
There is a leading article here appealing to the basest passions. Just
listen to this: "The hand that punishes should be impeccable, for, if
justice miscarries, the very bonds which unite society loosen of their
own accord." You understand the insinuation, eh? And, here again, among
the miscellaneous paragraphs, there's a story about a Countess eloping
with the son of a corn-factor. The papers ought not to be allowed to
publish such things. It tends to destroy the people's respect for the
upper classes.'
'But the serial story is still more odious,' interposed M.
d'Escorailles. 'It's all about a wife, a woman of good breeding, who
betrays her husband. And the author does not even make her feel any
remorse.'
Rougon made an angry gesture. 'Yes,' he said, 'my attention has already
been called to that number. You will see that I have marked certain
passages with a red pencil. And it is one of our own papers, too! Every
day I am obliged to go over it line by line. Ah! the best of them are
bad; we ought to suppress them all!' Then, compressing his lips, he
added, in a lower tone: 'I have sent for the editor, and am expecting
him here presently.'
The colonel had taken the paper from M. Kahn. He also soon vented
expressions of indignation, and then handed the print to M. Béjuin, who
likewise showed his disgust Rougon, in the meanwhile, was resting his
elbows on his table and reflecting, with eyes half-closed.
'By the way,' he said, turning to his secretary, 'that poor Huguenin
died yesterday. That leaves an inspectorship vacant. We shall have to
appoint somebody to it.' Then, as the three friends sitting before
the fire briskly raised their heads, he continued: 'Oh, it's a post of
no importance. Six thousand francs a year. But it's true that there's
absolutely nothing to do----'
However, he was interrupted by a person opening the door of an
adjoining room.
'Oh, come in, Monsieur Bouchard, come in!' he cried, 'I was just going
to call for you.'