However, he said no more on that subject, but sat for a few moments puffing at his cigarette.
'You have been down to Deux-Sèvres lately, and you were present at some ceremony there, were you not?' he presently continued. 'Are you quite sure of Monsieur Kahn's financial stability?'
'Oh, quite so!' exclaimed Rougon. And he launched into a series of explanatory details. M. Kahn, said he, was supported by a very rich English company. The shares of the railway from Niort to Angers were at a premium at the Bourse. The undertaking had very fine prospects before it.
The Emperor, however, seemed incredulous. 'I have heard a certain amount of fear expressed,' he said. 'You can understand that it would be very unfortunate for your name to be mixed up with a catastrophe. However, since you tell me that there is no reason for fear——' Then he again broke off and passed to a third subject. 'Now, about the prefect of Deux-Sèvres. He is very unpopular, people tell me. He appears to have thrown everything into confusion down there. I hear, too, that he is the son of a retired process-server, whose strange vagaries are the talk of the whole department. This Monsieur du Poizat is a friend of yours, I believe?'
'One of my best friends, sire.'
As the Emperor now rose from his seat, Rougon also got up. The former went to a window, and then came back again, puffing out a little cloudlet of smoke.
'You have a good many friends, Monsieur Rougon,' he said, with a meaning look.
'Yes, sire; a great many,' the minister frankly replied.
Evidently enough, the Emperor had hitherto merely repeated the gossip of the château, the accusations made by those who surrounded him. He was doubtless acquainted, however, with other stories, matters which were unknown to the Court, but of which he had learnt from his private agents, and in which he took a yet livelier interest, for he revelled in the spy system, in the secret manœuvring of the police. He looked at Rougon for a moment, while a vague smile played about his face. Then, in a confidential tone, and with a somewhat playful air, he said: 'Oh, I know a good many things; more, perhaps, than I care to know. Here is another little matter, now; you have taken in your offices a young man, a colonel's son, who has not obtained a bachelor's diploma. It is not a matter of any importance, I am aware of that; but if you only knew all the fuss that is made about such things! Little things like these put everybody's back up. It is really very bad policy on your part.'
Rougon made no reply. His Majesty had not finished. He opened his lips as though he were going to say something, but it was apparently something that he found rather difficult to express, for he hesitated for a moment or two. At last he stammered: 'I won't say anything to you about that usher, one of your protégés named Merle, I think. But he gets drunk and behaves insolently; and both the public and the clerks complain of him. All this is very annoying, very annoying indeed.' Then he raised his voice, and concluded somewhat bluntly: 'You have too many friends, Monsieur Rougon. All these people do you harm. It would be rendering you a service to make you quarrel with them. Well, at any rate let me have the resignation of Monsieur du Poizat, and promise me that you will abandon all the others.'