Vaudrey settled down in his chair with the profound satisfaction of a man who has not grown weary of an acquired possession.  This huge salon with its blackened pictures, cold marbles, and large, severe-looking bookcases, presented a sober bourgeois harmony that pleased him.  It was like the salon of a well-to-do notary, with its tall windows overlooking the courtyard, already full of the shadows of importunate callers and favor seekers whom the secretary-general received in a room adjoining the ministerial cabinet.  The minister inhaled once more the atmosphere of his new domicile before settling down to work.  Every morning it was his custom to read the reports of the Director of the Press and of the Prefect of Police before all else.

He took up the report of the Prefect.  Nothing serious.  A slight accident on the Vincennes line near the fortifications of Paris.  A train derailed.  A few injured.  In the Passage de l’Opera, the previous evening, the early speech of the Minister of the Interior upon general policy, and that of the Finance Minister, who was to reply to the rumor, falsely or prematurely announcing the conversion of the five per cents, had caused an upward movement in value.  All was satisfactory, all was quiet.  The new minister enjoyed public confidence.  Perfect.

Sulpice was delighted and passed on to the report of the Director of the Press.  Except a small number of disgruntled and irreconcilable party journals, all the French and foreign papers warmly praised and supported the newly-created ministry.  The Times declared that the coalition perfectly met the requirements of the existing situation.  The Berlin papers did not take umbrage at it, although Monsieur Vaudrey had more than once declared his militant patriotism from the tribune.  “In short,” the daily report concluded, “there is a concert of praise, and public opinion is delighted to have finally secured a legitimate satisfaction through the choice of a homogeneous ministry, such as has long been desired.”

“What strange literature,” muttered Sulpice, almost audibly, as he threw the report with the other documents.

He recalled how, on that morning when Sulpice Vaudrey sat there for the first time, the morning following Pichereau’s sudden dismissal from office, the editor of this daily press bulletin, like an automaton, mechanically and indifferently laid on the table of the minister a report wherein he said in full: 

“Public opinion, by the mouth of the accepted journals, has for too long a time reposed confidence in the Pichereau administration, for the ministry to be troubled about the approaching and useless interpellation announced some days ago by Monsieur Vaudrey—­of Isere—.”

And it was to Vaudrey, the elected successor of Pichereau, that the report was handed naturally and as was due.

“The compilers of these little chronicles are very optimistic,” thought Sulpice.  “After all, probably, it is the office that is responsible for this, as, doubtless, ministers do not like to know the truth.  I will see, however, that I get it.”