While this pretended revolutionary origin is advancing our friend’s prospects in one direction, in another the tale put forth to the worthy voters whom it is desirable to entice is different, but truer and not less striking to the minds of the country-people.  This is the gentlemen, they are told, who has bought the chateau of Arcis; and as the chateau of Arcis stands high above the town and is known to all the country round, it is to these simple folk a species of symbol.  They are always ready to return to memories of the past, which is much less dead and buried than people suppose; “Ah! he’s the seigneur of the chateau,” they say.

This, madame, is how the electoral kitchen is carried on and the way in which a deputy is cooked.

XVI

MARIE-GASTON TO THE COMTESSE DE L’ESTORADE

Arcis-sur-Aube, May 15, 1839.

Madame,—­You do me the honor to say that my letters amuse you, and you tell me not to fear that I send too many.

We are no longer at the Hotel de la Poste, having left it for the chateau; but thanks to the rivalry existing between the two inns, the Poste and the Mulet, in the latter of which Monsieur de Trailles has established his headquarters, we are kept informed of what is going on in the town and among our enemies.  Since our departure, as our late landlord informs us, a Parisian journalist has arrived at his hotel.  This individual, whose name I do not know, at once announced himself as Jack-the-giant-killer, sent down to reinforce with his Parisian vim and vigor the polemic which the local press, subsidized by the “bureau of public spirit,” has directed against us.

In that there is nothing very grave or very gay; since the world was a world, governments have always found pens for sale, and never have they failed to buy them; but the comedy of this affair begins with the co-arrival and the co-presence in the hotel of a young lady of very problematical virtue.  The name of this young lady as it appears on her passport is Mademoiselle Chocardelle; but the journalist in speaking of her calls her Antonia, or, when he wants to treat her with more respect, Mademoiselle Antonia.

Now, what can bring Mademoiselle Chocardelle to Arcis?  A pleasure trip, you will say, offered to her by the journalist, who combines with that object our daily defamation and his consequent earnings from the secret-service fund of the government.  Not at all; Mademoiselle Chocardelle has come to Arcis on business of her own,—­namely, to enforce a claim.

It seems that Charles Keller before his departure for Africa, where he met a glorious death, drew a note of hand, payable to Mademoiselle Antonia on order, for ten thousand francs, “value received in furniture,” a charming ambiguity, the furniture having been received by, and not from, Mademoiselle Chocardelle, who estimated at ten thousand francs the sacrifice she made in accepting it.