But before quitting Paris my father had an account to settle with his old colonel, St. Georges.
We mentioned previously that instead of joining his regiment St. Georges had found it more convenient to settle at Lille, where he induced the Government to place him in charge of a remount depot; in addition to this, by virtue of the powers which regimental heads arrogated to themselves at this period, he requisitioned an immense number of pleasure-horses, in which he traded.
The price these horses fetched was estimated at upwards of a million francs.
Although people were not very strict in those days at this kind of peccadillo, St. Georges went to such lengths that he was summoned to Paris to show his accounts. As St. Georges' books were very badly kept, he hit on the idea of throwing the blame upon my father, by saying it was Lieutenant-Colonel Dumas who had had charge of the regimental remounts.
The minister of war therefore wrote to my father, who immediately proved that he had never ordered a single requisition, nor bought nor sold a single horse.
The reply of the minister entirely exculpated my father from blame. But this did not lessen his grudge against St. Georges, and as his wen caused him horrible suffering and kept him in a perpetual state of irritability of temper, he positively swore he would fight a duel with his old colonel.
Brave though St. Georges was with pistol or sword in hand, he much preferred to choose his own duels. Fortunately or unfortunately, this one was noised abroad. My father called three times at St. Georges' house without finding him at home; he called again another three times, each time leaving his card. At length he wrote such a pressing threat in pencil on the last of these cards, that, the day but one after he had undergone his operation, my father, who was in bed and nursed by Dermoncourt (the captain who had turned the guillotine of St. Maurice into faggots), received a visit from St. Georges, who, on being told that the invalid was ill in bed, was about to leave his card and withdraw, when Dermoncourt, who had heard a great deal about him, seeing a magnificent specimen of a mulatto, who stuttered in his talk, recognised St. Georges, and ran after him.
"Ah! M. de St. Georges," he exclaimed, "is it you? Do not go away, I beseech you; for, ill though he is, the general is quite capable of running after you, so anxious is he to see you."
St. Georges at once made up his mind what part to play.