The deed was to take place on the 2d Brumaire.  On that day he was to be arrested, and accused of having premeditated a coup d’etat against the Directory.  Indeed, one M. de Mounier had come to Director Gohier and had denounced Bonaparte, whom he positively knew was conspiring to destroy the existing government.  Gohier received these accusations with much gravity, and sent at once for the other directors to hasten to him, but only one, Moulins, was then in Paris to answer Gohier’s summons.  He came, and after a long conference both directors agreed that the next day they would have Bonaparte arrested on his return to Paris from Malmaison, where they knew he was to give a large banquet that day.  They sent for the chief of police, and quietly gave him the order to station himself the next day with twelve resolute men on the road to Malmaison, and to arrest Bonaparte as he should drive that evening toward Paris.

On this very day Josephine, who did not wish to be present at the banquet of gentlemen in Malmaison, had come to Paris to attend a party at the house of one of her friends.  The conversation went on; they talked and jested, when a gentleman near Josephine told a friend that some striking event would probably take place that day in Paris, for he had just now met a friend who held an important office in the police.  He had invited him to go to the theatre, but he declined, stating that he was to be on duty this evening, as some important affair was about being transacted—­the arrest, as he thought, of some influential personage.

Josephine’s heart trembled with horrible misgivings at these words.  Love’s instinct convinced her that her husband was the one to be arrested, and she thought within herself that it was Destiny itself which sent her this intelligence, that she might save her husband from the fearful blow which awaited him.  Thus persuaded, she gathered all her strength and presence of mind, and determined to act with energy, and battle against the enemies of her husband.  Without betraying the slightest emotion, or exciting any suspicion that she had heard or noticed what was said, Josephine rose from her seat with a cheerful and composed countenance, and pleasantly took leave of the lady of the house.  But once past the threshold of the house, once in her carriage, her anxious nature woke up again, and she began to act with energy and resolution.  She pulled the string, to give her directions to the driver.  As fast as the horses could speed, he was to drive his mistress to Colonel Perrin, the commanding officer of the guards of the Directory.  In ten minutes she was there, and knowing well how devoted a guard he and all his soldiers would be to Bonaparte, she communicated to him her fears, and requested from him immediate and speedy assistance to remove the danger.

Colonel Perrin was prepared to enter into her plans, and he promised to send to Malmaison a company of grenadiers, provided she would, as soon as possible, have General Murat send him an order to that effect.  Josephine at once went to one of her true, reliable friends, who belonged to the Council of the Elders, and, making him acquainted with the danger which threatened her husband, requested him to gather a few devoted friends, and to attend to the orders which Murat would send them.