"In that case, I will accompany you as far as the Chamber.... I want to go and see what is happening at the National."
"What!" Bixio exclaimed. "Are you going like that, with your gun, through the streets?"
"Certainly!" I replied; "you seem to me to be going to do just the same."
"Yes, but only on this side of the Seine."
"Bah! I am in a shooting costume and not a fighting one."
"But shooting hasn't begun yet."
"All right, then; I will open the season."
However, as will be seen, I did not venture to cross the Tuileries with my accoutrements: I went round by the place de la Révolution, I crossed it without hindrance and went down the whole length of the rue Saint-Honoré. The barricades in the rue de l'Échelle and the rue des Pyramides had been broken down. When I reached the rue de Richelieu and saw a regiment at the top of the place Louvois, from the other side of the Palais-Royal a dense line of troops was visible, and a squadron of Lancers was stationed in the place du Palais-Royal. There was no passage left me unless I went back the way I had come. I found I was nearly opposite my old offices, No. 216. So I went in and upstairs to the first floor. There I found Oudard. He looked at me, hesitating whether to recognise me.
"What! is that you?" he asked.
"No doubt about that."