The Marquis de Gemosac, who was sitting in the background, gave a sharp little exclamation of surprise when Barebone stepped ashore, and turned to Dormer Colville to say in an undertone:
“Ah—but you need say nothing.”
“I promised you,” answered Colville, carelessly, “that I should tell you nothing till you had seen him.”
CHAPTER III — THE RETURN OF “THE LAST HOPE”
Not only France, but all Europe, had at this time to reckon with one who, if, as his enemies said, was no Bonaparte, was a very plausible imitation of one.
In 1849 France, indeed, was kind enough to give the world a breathing space. She had herself just come through one of those seething years from which she alone seems to have the power of complete recovery. Paris had been in a state of siege for four months; not threatened by a foreign foe, but torn to pieces by internal dissension. Sixteen thousand had been killed and wounded in the streets. A ministry had fallen. A ministry always does fall in France. Bad weather may bring about such a descent at any moment. A monarchy had been thrown down—a king had fled. Another king; and one who should have known better than to put his trust in a people.
Half a dozen generals had attempted to restore order in Paris and confidence in France. Then, at the very end of 1848, the fickle people elected this Napoleon, who was no Bonaparte, President of the new Republic, and Europe was accorded a breathing space. At the beginning of 1849 arrangements were made for it—military arrangements—and the year was almost quiet.
It was in the summer of the next year, 1850, that the Marquis de Gemosac journeyed to England. It was not his first visit to the country. Sixty years earlier he had been hurried thither by a frenzied mother, a little pale-faced boy, not bright or clever, but destined to pass through days of trial and years of sorrow which the bright and clever would scarcely have survived. For brightness must always mean friction, while cleverness will continue to butt its head against human limitations so long as men shall walk this earth.