"And I told you, Fouche, that if you do this—if you become a regicide a second time—I will be your unappeasable enemy your whole life long; I will undertake to avenge on you the death of the queen and her son; I will follow your every step with my hate, and will not rest till I have overthrown you. And you know well that Bonaparte loves me, that I have influence with him, and that what I mean to do, I accomplish at last by prayers, tears, and frowns. So do not exasperate me, Fouche; do not make me your irreconcilable enemy. Save the son of the king whom you killed, conciliate the shades of his unhappy parents. Fouche, we are in the cabinet of the queen! Here she often tarried, here she often pressed her son to her heart, and asked God's blessing on him. Fouche, the spirit of Marie Antoinette is with us, and she will know it if you in pity spare the life of her son. Marie Antoinette will accuse you at the throne of God, and plead with God to show you no compassion, if you refuse to be merciful to her son. Fouche, in the name of the queen—on my knees—I implore you, save her son!"
And Josephine, her face bathed in tears, sank before him and raised her folded hands suppliantly to Fouche. The minister, deeply moved, pale with the recollections which Josephine awakened within him, stooped down to her, and bade her arise; and when she refused, and begged and threatened, and wept, his obstinacy was at last touched, or perhaps his prudence, which counselled him to make a friend, rather than an enemy, out of the all-powerful wife of the future emperor.
"Rise, madame," he said. "What mortal is able to resist your requests, since Bonaparte himself cannot? I will save your protege, whatever shall come to me afterward from it."
She sprang up, and in the wildness of her joy threw her beautiful arms around Fouche's neck, and kissed him.
"Fouche," she said, "I give you this kiss in the name of Queen Marie Antoinette. It is a kiss of forgiveness, and of blessing. You swear to me that you will save him?"
"I swear it, madame!"
"And I swear to you that as soon as he is saved, and Bonaparte's anger can no longer reach him, I will confess all to my husband, and put it in such a Light that Bonaparte shall thank and reward you. Now tell me, how you will save him."
"I shall only be able if you will help me, madame."
"I am ready for any thing—that you know well. Tell me what I shall do."
"You must yourself direct a few lines to the young man, conjuring him in the name of his mother to fly, to save himself from the anger of the First Consul—to leave Europe."