Leo Tolstoy - 3 books to know Napoleonic Wars

He ceased, sat down, and a great silence fell.

‘There is a good actor,’ thought Julien. He made the mistake, then as always, of crediting people with too much cleverness.

Animated by the debates of so lively an evening, and above all by the sincerity of the discussion, at that moment M. de Nerval believed in his mission. With his great courage the man did not combine any sense.

Midnight struck during the silence that followed the fine peroration ‘that I will do’. Julien felt that there was something imposing and funereal in the sound of the clock. He was deeply moved.

The discussion soon began again with increasing energy and above all with an incredible simplicity. ‘These men will have me poisoned,’ thought Julien, at certain points. ‘How can they say such things before a plebeian?’

Two o’clock struck while they were still talking. The master of the house had long been asleep; M. de La Mole was obliged to ring to have fresh candles brought in. M. de Nerval, the Minister, had left at a quarter to two, not without having frequently studied Julien’s face in a mirror which hung beside him. His departure had seemed to create an atmosphere of relief.

While the candles were being changed: ‘Heaven knows what that fellow is going to say to the King!’ the man with the waistcoats murmured to his neighbour. ‘He can make us look very foolish and spoil our future.

‘You must admit that he shows a very rare presumption, indeed effrontery, in appearing here. He used to come here before he took office; but a portfolio alters everything, swallows up all a man’s private interests, he ought to have felt that.’

As soon as the Minister was gone, Bonaparte’s General had shut his eyes. He now spoke of his health, his wounds, looked at his watch, and left.

‘I would bet,’ said the man with the waistcoats, ‘that the General is running after the Minister; he is going to make his excuses for being found here, and pretend that he is our leader.’

When the servants, who were half asleep, had finished changing the candles:

‘Let us now begin to deliberate, Gentlemen,’ said the chairman, ‘and no longer attempt to persuade one another. Let us consider the tenor of the note that in forty-eight hours will be before the eyes of our friends abroad. There has been reference to Ministers. We can say, now that M. de Nerval has left us, what do we care for Ministers? We shall control them.’

The Cardinal showed his approval by a delicate smile.

‘Nothing easier, it seems to me, than to sum up our position,’ said the young Bishop of Agde with the concentrated and restrained fire of the most exalted fanaticism. Hitherto he had remained silent; his eye, which Julien had watched, at first mild and calm, had grown fiery after the first hour’s discussion. Now his heart overflowed like lava from Vesuvius.

‘From 1806 to 1814, England made only one mistake,’ he said, ‘which was her not dealing directly and personally with Napoleon. As soon as that man had created Dukes and Chamberlains, as soon as he had restored the Throne, the mission that God had entrusted to him was at an end; he was ripe only for destruction. The Holy Scriptures teach us in more than one passage the way to make an end of tyrants.’ (Here followed several Latin quotations.)

‘Today, Gentlemen, it is not a man that we must destroy; it is Paris. The whole of France copies Paris. What is the use of arming your five hundred men in each Department? A hazardous enterprise and one that will never end. What is the use of involving France in a matter which is peculiar to Paris? Paris alone, with her newspapers and her drawing-rooms, has done the harm; let the modern Babylon perish.

‘Between the Altar and Paris, there must be a fight to the finish. This catastrophe is indeed to the earthly advantage of the Throne. Why did not Paris dare to breathe under Bonaparte? Ask the artillery of Saint–Roch.’

It was not until three o’clock in the morning that Julien left the house with M. de La Mole.

The Marquis was depressed and tired. For the first time, in speaking to Julien, he used a tone of supplication. He asked him to promise never to disclose the excesses of zeal, such was his expression, which he had chanced to witness. ‘Do not mention it to our friend abroad, unless he deliberately insists on knowing the nature of our young hotheads. What does it matter to them if the State be overthrown? They will be Cardinals, and will take refuge in Rome. We, in our country seats, shall be massacred by the peasants.’

The secret note which the Marquis drafted from the long report of six and twenty pages, written by Julien, was not ready until a quarter to five.

‘I am dead tired,’ said the Marquis, ‘and so much can be seen from this note, which is lacking in precision towards the end; I am more dissatisfied with it than with anything I ever did in my life. Now, my friend,’ he went on, ‘go and lie down for a few hours, and for fear of your being abducted, I am going to lock you into your room.’

Next day, the Marquis took Julien to a lonely mansion, at some distance from Paris. They found there a curious company who, Julien decided, were priests. He was given a passport which bore a false name, but did at last indicate the true goal of his journey, of which he had always feigned ignorance. He started off by himself in a calash.

The Marquis had no misgivings as to his memory, Julien had repeated the text of the secret note to him several times; but he was greatly afraid of his being intercepted.

‘Remember, whatever you do, to look like a fop who is travelling to kill time,’ was his friendly warning, as Julien was leaving the room. ‘There may perhaps have been several false brethren in our assembly last night.’

The journey was rapid and very tedious. Julien was barely out of the Marquis’s sight before he had forgotten both the secret note and his mission, and was thinking of nothing but Mathilde’s scorn.

In a village, some leagues beyond Metz, the postmaster came to inform him that there were no fresh horses. It was ten o’clock at night; Julien, greatly annoyed, ordered supper. He strolled up and down outside the door and passed unperceived into the stable-yard. He saw no horses there.

‘The man had a singular expression all the same,’ he said to himself; ‘his coarse eye was scrutinising me.’

We can see that he was beginning not to believe literally everything that he was told. He thought of making his escape after supper, and in the meanwhile, in order to learn something of the lie of the land, left his room to go and warm himself by the kitchen fire. What was his joy upon finding there Signor Geronimo, the famous singer!

Comfortably ensconced in an armchair which he had made them push up close to the fire, the Neapolitan was groaning aloud and talking more, by himself, than the score of German peasants who were gathered round him open-mouthed.

‘These people are ruining me,’ he cried to Julien, ‘I have promised to sing tomorrow at Mayence. Seven Sovereign Princes have assembled there to hear me. But let us take the air,’ he added, in a significant tone.

When he had gone a hundred yards along the road, and was well out of earshot:

‘Do you know what is happening?’ he said to Julien; ‘this postmaster is a rogue. As I was strolling about, I gave a franc to a little ragamuffin who told me everything. There are more than a dozen horses in a stable at the other end of the village. They mean to delay some courier.’

‘Indeed?’ said Julien, with an innocent air.

It was not enough to have discovered the fraud, they must get on: this was what Geronimo and his friend could not manage to do. ‘We must wait for the daylight,’ the singer said finally, ‘they are suspicious of us. Tomorrow morning we shall order a good breakfast; while they are preparing it we go out for a stroll, we escape, hire fresh horses, and reach the next post.’