The Companions of Jehu by Alexandre Dumas (red scrolls of magic .txt) 📕

“Citizen president,” replied the young man, “we are prisoners in the palace.”

“Prisoners? What do you mean?”

“The guard has been changed, and General Jubé is no longer in command.”

“Who has replaced him?”

“I think some one said General Moreau.”

“Moreau? Impossible! And that coward, Barras, where is he?”

“He has started for his country-place at Grosbois.”

“Ah! I must see Moulins!” cried Gohier, rushing to the door. But at the entrance he found a sentry who barred the door. Gohier insisted.

“No one can pass,” said the sentry.

“What! not pass?”

“No.”

“But I am President Gohier!”

“No one can pass,” said the sentry; “that is the order.”

Gohier saw it would be useless to say more; force would be impossible. He returned to his own rooms.

In the meantime, General Moreau had gone to see Moulins; he wished to justify himself. Without listening to a word the ex-Director turned his back on him, and, as Moreau insisted, he said: “General, go into the ante-chamber. That is the place for jailers.”

Moreau bowed his head, and understood for the first time into what a fatal trap his honor had fallen.

At five o’clock, Bonaparte started to return to the Rue de la Victoire; all the generals and superior officers in Paris accompanied him. The blindest, those who had not understood the 13th Vendemiaire, those who had not yet understood the return from Egypt, now saw, blazing over the Tuileries, the star of his future, and as everybody could not be a planet, each sought to become a satellite.

The shouts of “Vive Bonaparte!” which came from the lower part of the Rue du Mont Blanc, and swept like a sonorous wave toward the Rue de la Victoire, told Josephine of her husband’s return. The impressionable Creole had awaited him anxiously. She sprang to meet him in such agitation that she was unable to utter a single word.

“Come, come!” said Bonaparte, becoming the kindly man he was in his own home, “calm yourself. We have done to-day all that could be done.”

“Is it all over?”

“Oh, no!” replied Bonaparte.

“Must it be done all over again to-morrow?”

“Yes, but to-morrow it will be merely a formality.”

That formality was rather rough; but every one knows of the events at Saint-Cloud. We will, therefore, dispense with relating them, and turn at once to the result, impatient as we are to get back to the real subject of our drama, from which the grand historical figure we have introduced diverted us for an instant.

One word more. The 20th Brumaire, at one o’clock in the morning, Bonaparte was appointed First Consul for ten years. He himself selected Cambacérès and Lebrun as his associates under the title of Second Consuls, being firmly resolved this time to concentrate in his own person, not only all the functions of the two consuls, but those of the ministers.

The 20th Brumaire he slept at the Luxembourg in president Gohier’s bed, the latter having been liberated with his colleague Moulins.

Roland was made governor of the Luxembourg.