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CHAPTER XXXVIII

BLUM LOSES HIS SITUATION

"WELL,' said the marquis, 'who are you? The eldest son of the duc de Berry?'

'Yes,' Lucien said thoughtfully. I intend to make good my claim-to Thiers,' he added.

'I thought you despised Kings—that you had no ambition except to be a poet.'

'It is true.'

'I see. You urge your claim. If he consents to release Madame, you desist?'

'I promised her that my claim, if claim there were, should never be enforced. But I think she would forgive this, as things are.'

'She has nothing to forgive you. She has forsaken her own cause.'

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'I know,' said Lucien. But I must not forsake it.' 'I only knew because of a certain free-masonry that exists between those who have had a like experience,' said the marquis. 'But you?'

'Sir, you have the right to ask any other question you like of me.'

'Does anyone else know?'

'Not a soul.'

'You had not heard of this when we were at la Pénissière?'

'No.'

'She must have been very imprudent.'

Lucien was silent.

'I should do as you do,' said the marquis at last. 'After all, what is the use of life except to live? How do you propose to set about it? How will you get at Thiers?'

'I must find my friend, Charles Blum. He is handand-glove with the Minister.'

'Do not see him at his own house! Meet him somewhere. You will have to exact a promise that your liberty is not interfered with. Remember that you have compromised yourself. You are no more safe than I am. If Thiers refuses to have any dealings

with you? '

6

'I must save her some other way.'

It is just possible that Thiers may welcome your interference. She exasperated him; but it was a false move to take her prisoner. What are they going to do with her? We are not in the Middle Ages.'

'She cannot remain in their hands; she must escape. I will find Blum at once.'

'You have not far to look. There he goes! Stay, do not attract attention! Walk along on the other side of the street until he sees you.'

Lucien followed the advice, but Blum seemed to be afflicted with blindness. He plodded past, his eyes on the pavement, and never raised them once. 'Blum!'

Apparently the person addressed was deaf as well as blind. He made no sign whatever.

They were by this time at some distance from the Three Elephants. Lucien crossed over, and, laughing, took him by the shoulder.

'What a fool you must be, Lucien !' cried his friend

angrily. It was bad enough at Nantes, where you were always running under my nose.

Do you want

to compel me to give you up to the police?'

I want to see Thiers. I will see him, too, and at
You must take me to him.'

once.

In his short passage up the street, Lucien had contrived to forget every word of de Civrac's warning. Finally, Blum consented. When Lucien had a thing at heart, he was, to certain natures, irresistible; and Blum was one of these.

The Minister of the Interior was at home.

'Our friend, the poet? Oh yes, I shall be charmed to see him! The interview must be private, you say? Ah, well, Joly and two of his men are in the next room waiting to speak with me; but there is a curtain between-they will hear nothing. study.'

You can wait in the

Blum waited twenty minutes, after which the Minister came out alone.

'You will not see your friend again just at present,' he remarked.

Something in his unusually suave tones alarmed Blum.

'What has happened, sir?'

'I think he is not quite sane,' said Thiers. 'We shall try the effect of a little restraint. In the present excited state of the country, it is not safe for lunatics to be at large. A great English thinker suggested once that a nation, like an individual, might go mad. The possibility of it has been proved over and over again in France. It was proved the other day in the case of the duchess. The Jeunes-France-who are the maddest of the many madmen about-saluted

this young fellow as a Duke at the Maison Botherel. We have Dukes enough, as it is. Besides, I find that he all but set Lyons on fire six months ago. I underrated the power of a Song, it seems. I cannot give him the chance again.'

Sir,' said Blum earnestly, 'you promised that no harm should come to him.'

'Exactly. I am keeping him out of harm's way. I can give you no further information about him now. Good-night, my dear Blum.'

'I must know where my friend is, sir.'

Blum's temper was rising.

'He is quite safe.'

'If you can tell me nothing further, sir, I must leave your service.'

'As you will!' said Thiers indifferently. 'I dare say you are right in your decision. There are forty other applicants for the post.'

CHAPTER XXXIX

JEANNE CONSENTS

ONCE more, upon a quiet moonlit night in cold and early Spring, Lucien walked up the avenue of poplar trees at Morfontaine.

He moved gravely, slowly, as if he suspected a foe behind each thin rounded stem. The eyes that had been wont to gaze up and away were now alert as those of a fox; and he was listening not with his ears only, but with his eyes. He took minute care not to make the least noise as he went. Yet within he was shouting and singing. The eighteen months that had passed since Thiers arrested and threw him into prison had given him an outward cautiousness of manner that might last a week, perhaps; they had not broken that independent spirit.

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'If they were all dead,' he cried to himself, Madame -the marquis-Jeanne-that blessèd dear old fool, Charles Blum-still I am free!'

A sudden chill of horror froze his soul in the midst of his exultation.

'All these are older than I am-excepting Jeanne. It will be true one day.'

He glanced at the moon.
Not a minute older.'

And, 'Not so old as you were this time two years ago!' he cried to the backward buds of the poplartrees.

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