Baranoff took courage from Alexander’s hesitancy.
“Let me retire from office. I stipulate only that you shall write across my congé, ‘Dismissed for being faithful to a Czar.’”
“Fidelity to a sovereign may be carried too far,” said Alexander, who had not forgotten the lessons of his Republican tutor, La Harpe.
“True, Sire,” replied Baranoff, who knew how to trim his sails to meet the changing breeze. “And, therefore, when fidelity ceased to be a virtue I withdrew my allegiance.”
“Since when did you withdraw your allegiance from Paul?” sneered Benningsen.
“Since yesterday at three in the afternoon,” retorted Baranoff. “Sire, in dismissing me you dismiss the man to whom you owe both life and throne.”
“Why, this is the language of treason,” said Benningsen, fingering the hilt of his sabre and much regretting that he could not deal with Baranoff as he had dealt with Voronetz.
“Speak on,” said Alexander, mentally contrasting the Count’s deference with the General’s brusquerie.
Benningsen and Pahlen were both disposed to play the master; it might be well, then, to have in the ministry a counterforce in the person of Baranoff.
“Seeing that your father Paul,” continued Baranoff, addressing the Czar, “imprisoned you and the Grand Duke Constantine for a trifling breach of military etiquette, to what point would his anger have risen had he known that you were at the head of a conspiracy formed to deprive him of his crown?”