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Madame Garain, her chin softly dropped on her chest, slept in the peace of her housewifely mind, and dreamed of her vegetable garden on the banks of the Loire, where singing-societies came to serenade her. Joseph Schmoll and General Lariviere came out of the smoking-room. The General took a seat between Princess Seniavine and Madame Martin.
Garain, who did not like Paul Vence's ingenious turn of wit and language, tried to hasten the conclusion: "In a word," he said, "there was something of the monster in the man." "There are no monsters," replied Paul Vence; "and men who pass for monsters inspire horror. Napoleon was loved by an entire people. He had the power to win the love of men. The joy of his soldiers was to die for him."
At the two semicircles, whereby the dinner-table was prolonged, were M. Montessuy, robust, with blue eyes and ruddy complexion; a young cousin, Madame Belleme de Saint-Nom, embarrassed by her long, thin arms; the painter Duviquet; M. Daniel Salomon; then Paul Vence and Garain the deputy; Belleme de Saint-Nom; an unknown senator; and Dechartre, who was dining at the house for the first time.
"Then you do not know, Monsieur Garain, that one does the same things for very different reasons?" Montessuy said she was right. "It is very true, as you say, Madame, that actions prove nothing.
He had already gone out of the door when he struck his forehead with his hand. "We have forgotten the Ministry of War." "We shall easily find somebody for it among the generals," said Count Martin. "Ah," exclaimed Garain, "you believe the choice of a minister of war is easy. It is clear you have not, like me, been a member of three cabinets and President of the Council.
"It is, perhaps, because reality is not beautiful," said Paul Vence. M. Garain said that he had always been in favor of all possible improvements. He had asked for the suppression of permanent armies in the time of the Empire, for the separation of church and state, and had remained always faithful to democracy. His device, he said, was "Order and Progress."
The General wished to please Garain, and he had no other idea. However, he succeeded, after an effort, in formulating a judgment: "Napoleon committed faults; in his situation he should not have committed any." And he stopped abruptly, very red. Madame Martin asked: "And you, Monsieur Vence, what do you think of Napoleon?"
Leaving Garain to his combination, he was preoccupied by his fair hostess, trying to divine her tastes and her habits, asking her whether she went to the theatre, and if she ever went at night to the coffee-house with her husband. And Therese was beginning to think he was more interesting than the others, with his apparent ignorance of her world and his superb cynicism. Gamin arose.
Garain, who was not cynical, made no answer. "Garain, do you not yet know," asked Count Martin, "whether with the Premiership you are to take the Seals or the Interior?" Garain replied that his decision would depend on the choice which some one else would make. The presence of that personage in the Cabinet was necessary, and he hesitated between two portfolios.
Garain, who had founded his political fortune on hatred of the Empire, judged sincerely that this return of national taste was only an absurd infatuation. He saw no danger in it and felt no fear about it. In him fear was sudden and ferocious. For the moment he was very quiet; he talked neither of prohibiting performances nor of seizing books, of imprisoning authors, or of suppressing anything.
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