“Is that an encouragement to enter this shady path, where, you say, he might have asked me to follow him?”
“But if I myself,” said du Portail, “should offer to guide you in it, what then?”
“You, monsieur!” said la Peyrade, in stupefaction.
“Yes, I—I who was your uncle’s pupil at first, and later his protector and providence; I, whose influence the last half-century has daily increased; I, who am wealthy; I, to whom all governments, as they fall one on top of the others like houses of cards, come to ask for safety and for the power to rebuild their future; I, who am the manager of a great theatre of puppets (where I have Columbines in the style of Madame de Godollo); I, who to-morrow, if it were necessary to the success of one of my vaudevilles or one of my dramas, might present myself to your eyes as the wearer of the grand cordon of the Legion of honor, of the Order of the Black Eagle, or that of the Golden Fleece. Do you wish to know why neither you nor I will die a violent death like your uncle, and also why, more fortunate than contemporaneous kings, I can transmit my sceptre to the successor whom I myself may choose? Because, like you, my young friend, in spite of your Southern appearance, I was cold, profoundly calculating, never tempted to lose my time on trifles at the outskirts; because heat, when I was led by force of circumstances to employ it, never went below the surface. It is more than probable that you have heard of me; well, for you I will open a window in my cloud; look at me, observe me well; have I a cloven hoof, or a tail at the end of my spine? On the contrary, am I not a model of the most inoffensive of householders in the Saint-Sulpice quarter? In that quarter, where I have enjoyed, I may say it, universal esteem for the last twenty-five years, I am called du Portail; but to you, if you will allow me, I shall now name myself Corentin.”
“Corentin!” cried la Peyrade, with terrified astonishment.
“Yes, monsieur; and you see that in telling you that secret I lay my hand upon you, and enlist you. Corentin! ‘the greatest man of the police in modern times,’ as the author of an article in the ‘Biographies of Living Men’ has said of me—as to whom I ought in justice to remark that he doesn’t know a thing about my life.”
“Monsieur,” said la Peyrade, “I can assure you that I shall keep that secret; but the place which you offer me near you—in your employ—”
“That frightens you, or, at least, it makes you uneasy,” said Corentin, quickly. “Before you have even considered the thing the word scares you, does it? The police! Police! you are afraid to encounter the terrible prejudice that brands it on the brow.”
“Certainly,” said la Peyrade, “it is a necessary institution; but I do not think that it is always calumniated. If the business of those who manage it is honorable why do they conceal themselves so carefully?”
“Because all that threatens society, which it is the mission of the police to repress,” replied Corentin, “is plotted and prepared in hiding. Do thieves and conspirators put upon their hats, ‘I am Guillot, the shepherd of this flock’? And when we are after them must we ring a bell to let them know we are coming?”