Chapter III: Cross Purposes

The same day as that on which occurred the scene just described, that is to say, the 17th Brumaire, year VIII (November 7, 1799), the following events took place at the home of Monsieur Hubert, banker and member of the Council of Ancients and uncle to Charlotte. This exponent of high finance had tenfold increased his fortune by his enterprises in furnishing supplies to the army, or, in other words, robbing the people and famishing the soldiers. In conference with the banker was the reverend Father Morlet; politics was on the carpet.

"My reverend sir," asked Hubert, "will you please to tell me why the Catholic and royalist party is taking no hand in political affairs? Do you not comprehend that in supporting the dictatorship of Bonaparte you deal the last blow to the Republic?"

"And who will profit thereby? Just clarify me on that point."

"He will, as a matter of course."

"Bonaparte's ambition is boundless," returned the Jesuit. "He is not ignorant that a monarchy which owes its restoration to a Monck has no more dire need than, as soon as it no longer needs his treasons, to rid itself of the traitor. It is thus more than probable that General Bonaparte prefers the role of a Cromwell, or a Caesar. In either of these two cases we Catholics and royalists must oppose him, for he would thus put off for a long time the return of the Old Regime. But as, after all, and in spite of its improbability, there is one chance in a thousand that he may be looking out for a restoration, we maintain for the present complete neutrality."

"Monsieur John Lebrenn asks to speak with you, sir," announced a valet.

"John Lebrenn in Paris!--Pray Monsieur Lebrenn to wait an instant!" cried the banker to the valet, who at once left the room to execute his master's orders.

"My dear Monsieur Hubert, I am not at all anxious for a meeting with that red-cap Jacobin, and for reasons of a particular nature," said the Jesuit.

"Step into my cabinet. Thence you can descend by the little staircase."

"In case of unforeseen developments, write me, or--you know----"

"Oh, I forgot to ask you about the Count of Plouernel."

"He is," replied the Jesuit, "at Vienna, with his wife, who has just presented him with a son, according to what the Count's brother, the Bishop _in partibus_, whom you know, has just written me."

"And your god-son, little Rodin?"

"He is growing up under the eye of the Lord. He is in Rome, attending the seminary of our Society."

The financier conducted Father Morlet to the door of the cabinet, and then rang for the valet to show in Monsieur Lebrenn at once.

"What can be the motive of my nephew's coming now to Paris?" pondered Hubert. "I hope he bears no bad news from my poor sister. Her last letters foreshadowed nothing untoward. Ah, here he is. Welcome, my dear nephew," he cried as he held out his hand, "welcome! And first of all put me at ease about my sister and niece. Are they well?"

"Charlotte and her mother are in perfect health," answered Lebrenn. "They charged me to visit you and tell you so, and I have made it a point to deliver the message the very day of my arrival. We are living happily in the peaceful town of Vannes, and still occupied in our cloth trade."

"From which I conclude that you no longer trouble yourself with politics. I congratulate you upon your wisdom, my dear nephew. The Republic is a chimera, as I said long ago. Look at it to-day, as good as dead, and to-morrow it will have heaved its last sigh. You come just in time to attend the funeral. May it never rise from its ashes."

"The Republic is like Lazarus in the Scriptures. It may be wrapped in its shroud, it will burst the stones of its sepulture. But let us leave politics aside; we are not agreed on the matter, and never will be. I am asked by my wife and her mother to inquire of you after the health of my father-in-law, your colleague in the Council of Ancients, of whom we have no news."

"My brother-in-law is still the same, dragging his miserable life from apostasy to apostasy, tormented by the fear of death."

"What an existence!"

"He is, indeed, the most cowardly of men, and at the same time the most talkative and vain of lawyers. Then, his position of Representative of the people in the Convention, and now as deputy in the Council of Ancients, flatters his vanity, and furnishes him with the opportunity to give a loose to his voluble oratory. So, tossed back and forth between his vanity, which impels him toward the hazards of political life, just now so tempestuous, and his cowardice, which makes him tremble each day lest he receive the reward of his apostasies, the miserable fellow's life is kept, as the Catholics say, in perpetual hell."

"Monsieur Desmarais!" announced the valet.

The lawyer, barely across the threshold, stopped stock still, as surprised as put out of sorts by the unexpected presence of his son-in-law; for a moment he was unable to utter a word, and Hubert said to him sardonically:

"How, brother! Is it so that you greet your son-in-law after so many years' separation?"

"Monsieur Lebrenn should know," at length replied the lawyer, regaining his self-assurance, "that a deep gulf separates honest men from the Jacobins of '93, the Septembrists, Terrorists, Communists, and other Socialists."

"Citizen Desmarais, we have known each other a long time," retorted Lebrenn. "You are the father of my dear wife, to whom my life owes its happiness. Whatever may be your words or your conduct toward me, there are limits which I shall never exceed in my treatment of you. You inspire me neither with anger nor hatred, but with a profound pity, for you are unhappy."

"What insolence! To hear such words issue from the lips of my daughter's husband, and be unable to punish him for them!"

"My pity for you is very natural," continued Lebrenn. "I pity your condition because you must feel a cruel chagrin at being separated from your wife and daughter."

"Scurrilous fellow!" bellowed the attorney, unable to contain himself. "It is you who came to sow trouble and discord between the members of my family and me."

"Citizen Desmarais, you are arrived at the decline of life; your solitude weighs upon you. You regret, you regret each day anew the sweets of the domestic hearth; our home is and always will be open to you. Renounce your life in politics, the incessant source of your anguish and your alarms, because of your lack of steadfastness. Return to your wife and daughter; they will forget the past. But when fear has its clutch upon you, you are like a person out of his mind; though you may be in perfect safety, yet you will perish anyhow. So then, when you please, Citizen Desmarais, you will find a place at our fireside. You will enjoy with us an existence as peaceful and happy as your present one is tortured."

Then to Hubert he added:

"Adieu, citizen. I shall return before my departure, to get your messages for Vannes."

"Adieu, dear nephew," answered the latter. "Although a Jacobin, you have my esteem."