Mr. Talleyrand laughed, a high, rasping laugh, but evidently intended to be of great good humor.
"I will give you a certificate, Mr. Livingston, and you can send it home to your government, that you are the most importunate negotiator I have ever met with."
Their conference seemed to be ended; they turned and walked toward the house, leaving me to ponder with wonder and amaze at what I had listened to, and with keen admiration for the part Mr. Livingston had taken in the matter. I had always been led to believe that no man could hold his own against the shrewd and unfathomable Abbé; but, if I mistook not, this time Mr. Livingston had not only held his own, but got much the better of him.
Suddenly a thought flashed into my mind. What did Talleyrand mean by repeating over and over, and in such significant phrase, that his answer must be "evasive"? Could it be possible that he was intimating that a consideration would be necessary to make it more decided? I believed that he had so intimated, and that Mr. Livingston had understood him, and had repelled the intimation with scorn.
Then again there flashed into my mind the two million dollars that had been voted the President to use "as he thought best" in adjusting this matter. Was it intended to use in buying up "such creatures," I said scornfully to myself, "as Talleyrand"? Vague insinuations in those speeches in Congress I had listened to now seemed to me as clear as day.
Hot with indignation and shame,—my indignation for Talleyrand, my shame that my country could stoop to such measures,—I rushed into the house to my uncle. He had been entertaining Colonel Livingston while the other two were holding their conference; but all three gentlemen were gone now, and I found him sitting quietly in his library, reading. I had flung the door wide as I entered, and I stopped on the threshold.
"Monsieur, what does it mean?" I cried. "Does Monsieur Talleyrand want Mr. Livingston to offer him a bribe? And were the two millions of dollars given to Mr. Jefferson for such base purposes?"
My uncle looked up, startled and amazed beyond measure. He did not at all take in my meaning, but he was very sensible of my rudeness. My uncle was ever the most amiable of men and the most tolerant, but for correctness of deportment and elegance of manner he was a stickler, and so flagrant a breach of both was intolerable to him.
"I think you forget yourself, sir," he said coldly; and that was all he said, but his words cut like tempered steel in quivering flesh. A great wave of mortification rushed in a crimson flood to the very roots of my hair.
"I am most truly sorry, sir, to have been so rude," I stammered, "and I beg you will not think that we do not know good manners in America. I fear I am ever slow to think and headlong to act, and it has often brought me to grief."