The manners of the time suggested distrust on all sides, and I answered, guardedly, that I had some intention of visiting England.
“You will see them, then,” resumed he, “and even that much is a blessing in itself! How do I envy you! Ah, monsieur, if the name should not escape you, will you try and remember Claude Mirepois? My father was head postilion in the royal stables, and enjoyed his pension to his death; and I was educated by order of the princes, and was to have been in the household too.”
“Are we all right and regular, citizen?” broke in the conducteur, putting in his head.
“All right—quite right, citizen Guichemar,” said the other, in some confusion. “These are ticklish times; I was anxious to see that this youth's pass was regular.”
“Parbleu! a conscript is always en règle,” said the other, laughing, and so hurried me away to the diligence; and once more we rattled along on our journey.
The whole of that night my mind dwelt upon this incident. Amongst the various parties that disputed for preeminence in the country, I had never heard of any professing royalist principles, except the Vendeans; nor had I the slightest suspicion that many concealed monarchists held places of trust under the government of the republic.
At Havre, I discovered that the measures of the police were of the very strictest kind, and that to obtain a permission to embark, it was necessary to have a reference to some citizen of the town, who should stand guarantee for your loyalty and integrity. Now, I had never been there before; I knew none, not even by name; and what was I to do? Great as my difficulty was, I did not suffer it to appear so to the commissary, but calmly said that I 'd return to my hotel, and run my eye over a list of the merchants for one to be my bail.
The packet was to sail that evening with the tide; and as the office of the commissaire closed at four o'clock, there was little time to lose. I wandered on “from street to street; I walked into cafés; I sat down in the most public places, scanning with eagerness every face that passed me, and straining my eyes to try and detect the features of an acquaintance. The pursuit became at length a perfect farce, and I hurried to and fro with a burning brain, and a restless impatience that was almost maddening.
“Parbleu! this is the fourth time you've been in here to-day,” cried a short, thickset man, past the prime of life, and who kept a sort of slop-shop near the quay. “What do you want with me, my lad?”
I was turning to leave the spot without replying, when he closed the half-door of his shop, and placed his back against it.