He felt, or rather he knew, that M. Loubet had had nothing to do with the visit of the Tsar to Paris beyond receiving him when he called at the Luxembourg in defiance of etiquette and precedent.
With a friend of his at the Elysée, the position of M. Clemenceau was perhaps even stronger than if he himself had been established within its walls. He had always admired the personality of Père Joseph, so well known in the history of France as the adviser and counsellor of Richelieu. He intended playing the same part; to govern under M. Loubet’s name as far as the constitution allowed him, to govern the Republic which he secretly despised, but to which he clung, because he knew that it was the only government under which he could do absolutely what he liked.
M. Clemenceau had taken a sincere liking to a very attractive and very beautiful lady. He is still on terms of great friendship with her, notwithstanding the fact that she is no longer young, and that white locks have taken the place of her golden curls. She is an American, the daughter of that Colonel Burdan who invented the rifle which still bears his name. She had married a French diplomat, the Comte d’Aunay, and was noted in her youth for her extraordinary loveliness. Mme. d’Aunay was ambitious above everything, and her great dream was to see her husband become an Ambassador. She imagined that M. Clemenceau could help her to realise her one ambition, and she then set herself to win his friendship for herself and for her husband. The task was easy enough for a woman gifted with such beauty and such remarkable intelligence, and though the world chatted not a little—as so often it does without foundation—concerning this friendship, yet secretly it envied her for her cleverness in having won him as a well-wisher. Then one day came the crash and the blighting of the fair Countess’s hopes. The French Ministry for Foreign Affairs became alarmed at the marvellous way in which M. Clemenceau was kept informed of what was going on in diplomatic circles at Copenhagen, where Count d’Aunay was accredited as French Minister, and wondered how he could be in possession of the most secret information before even it became known at the Quai d’Orsay. Inquiries
M. M. F. SADI-CARNOT
(President 1887-1894)
M. J. P. P. CASIMIR PÉRIER