It was an amplification of this scene, doubtless, which caused the appearance in one of the newspapers of an article entitled “Attack on La Maison Sallandrouze.”
Happily, however, the expected raid never took place, for civil strife was averted. MacMahon, far from arresting Mme. Adam’s friends, called on them to form a government. The Dufaure Cabinet came into office in December 1877.
Most of the new ministers were habitués of Mme. Adam’s salon. The new Minister of Public Works, M. de Freycinet,[284] was Gambetta’s rival in her friendship. While for her Friday dinner-parties the Great Tribune in consultation with his hostess chose such fellow-guests as were likely to serve ce pouvoir occulte, which this statesman out of office was beginning to exercise, the Wednesday dinners were known as “The Freycinet Evenings.”
Mme. Adam’s friendship with M. de Freycinet has endured to the present day. Already, in the middle seventies, “so bleached,” writes Sir Sidney Colvin, “as to be known as la souris blanche,” he has lived to be a member of the War Cabinet of 1916.
Mme. Adam’s widowhood was still young when people began to speak of her re-marriage. “Several times over,” she writes, “rumour had married me to Gambetta.” Of another charming and wealthy Republican widow, Mme. Arnaud de l’Ariège, the same report was circulated. “Chacune son tour,” said Mme. Adam, laughing, to her supposed rival. And Mme. Arnaud replied: “Yes, but we know too well where Gambetta’s affections are fixed to believe any gossip about his marriage unless it should be to Mlle. L——”[285]
Far from becoming more intimate, as we shall see in the next chapter, Juliette Adam and Gambetta were now beginning to disagree. These differences and other reasons made her think of leaving Paris before her accustomed time. “As I emerge from my mourning,” she writes, “more than one among my friends begins to regard me rather as a woman than a widow.”[286] She was planning a new novel, Grecque; and in order to study a suitable background she resolved to visit Naples. How strained her relations with Gambetta were becoming was proved by their farewell. “It would have been better for me had you started a few weeks earlier,” said her friend. “Ah! if you had been able to play Napoléon, you would have been delighted to give me un petit air de Mme. de Staël,” she retorted.[287]
FOOTNOTES:
[254] Souvenirs, IV. 286-7.
[255] Souvenirs, V. 276.
[256] p. 140.