Castles in the Air Read online

  1.

  My name is Ratichon--Hector Ratichon, at your service, and I make sobold as to say that not even my worst enemy would think of minimizingthe value of my services to the State. For twenty years now have Iplaced my powers at the disposal of my country: I have served theRepublic, and was confidential agent to Citizen Robespierre; I haveserved the Empire, and was secret factotum to our great Napoleon; Ihave served King Louis--with a brief interval of one hundred days--for the past two years, and I can only repeat that no one, in thewhole of France, has been so useful or so zealous in trackingcriminals, nosing out conspiracies, or denouncing traitors as I havebeen.

  And yet you see me a poor man to this day: there has been apersistently malignant Fate which has worked against me all theseyears, and would--but for a happy circumstance of which I hope anon totell you--have left me just as I was, in the matter of fortune, when Ifirst came to Paris and set up in business as a volunteer police agentat No, 96 Rue Daunou.

  My apartment in those days consisted of an antechamber, an outeroffice where, if need be, a dozen clients might sit, waiting theirturn to place their troubles, difficulties, anxieties before theacutest brain in France, and an inner room wherein that same acutebrain--mine, my dear Sir--was wont to ponder and scheme. Thatapartment was not luxuriously furnished--furniture being very dear inthose days--but there were a couple of chairs and a table in the outeroffice, and a cupboard wherein I kept the frugal repast which servedme during the course of a long and laborious day. In the inner officethere were more chairs and another table, littered with papers:letters and packets all tied up with pink tape (which cost three sousthe metre), and bundles of letters from hundreds of clients, from thehighest and the lowest in the land, you understand, people who wroteto me and confided in me to-day as kings and emperors had done in thepast. In the antechamber there was a chair-bedstead for Theodore tosleep on when I required him to remain in town, and a chair on whichhe could sit.

  And, of course, there was Theodore!

  Ah! my dear Sir, of him I can hardly speak without feeling choked withthe magnitude of my emotion. A noble indignation makes me dumb.Theodore, sir, has ever been the cruel thorn that times out of numberhath wounded my over-sensitive heart. Think of it! I had picked himout of the gutter! No! no! I do not mean this figuratively! I meanthat, actually and in the flesh, I took him up by the collar of histattered coat and dragged him out of the gutter in the Rue Blanche,where he was grubbing for trifles out of the slime and mud. He wasfrozen, Sir, and starved--yes, starved! In the intervals of pickingfilth up out of the mud he held out a hand blue with cold to thepassers-by and occasionally picked up a sou. When I found him in thatpitiable condition he had exactly twenty centimes between him andabsolute starvation.

  And I, Sir Hector Ratichon, the confidant of two kings, threeautocrats and an emperor, took that man to my bosom--fed him, clothedhim, housed him, gave him the post of secretary in my intricate,delicate, immensely important business--and I did this, Sir, at asalary which, in comparison with his twenty centimes, must have seemeda princely one to him.

  His duties were light. He was under no obligation to serve me or to beat his post before seven o'clock in the morning, and all that he hadto do then was to sweep out the three rooms, fetch water from the wellin the courtyard below, light the fire in the iron stove which stoodin my inner office, shell the haricots for his own mess of pottage,and put them to boil. During the day his duties were lighter still. Hehad to run errands for me, open the door to prospective clients, showthem into the outer office, explain to them that his master wasengaged on affairs relating to the kingdom of France, and generallyprove himself efficient, useful and loyal--all of which qualities heassured me, my dear Sir, he possessed to the fullest degree. And Ibelieved him, Sir; I nurtured the scorpion in my over-sensitive bosom!I promised him ten per cent. on all the profits of my business, andall the remnants from my own humble repasts--bread, the skins ofluscious sausages, the bones from savoury cutlets, the gravy from thetasty carrots and onions. You would have thought that his gratitudewould become boundless, that he would almost worship the benefactorwho had poured at his feet the full cornucopia of comfort and luxury.Not so! That man, Sir, was a snake in the grass--a serpent--acrocodile! Even now that I have entirely severed my connexion withthat ingrate, I seem to feel the wounds, like dagger-thrusts, which hedealt me with so callous a hand. But I have done with him--done, Itell you! How could I do otherwise than to send him back to the gutterfrom whence I should never have dragged him? My goodness, he repaidwith an ingratitude so black that you, Sir, when you hear the fullstory of his treachery, will exclaim aghast.

  Ah, you shall judge! His perfidy commenced less than a week after Ihad given him my third best pantaloons and three sous to get his haircut, thus making a man of him. And yet, you would scarcely believe it,in the matter of the secret documents he behaved toward me like averitable Judas!

  Listen, my dear Sir.

  I told you, I believe, that I had my office in the Rue Daunou. Youunderstand that I had to receive my clients--many of whom were ofexalted rank---in a fashionable quarter of Paris. But I actually lodgedin Passy--being fond of country pursuits and addicted to fresh air--in ahumble hostelry under the sign of the "Grey Cat"; and here, too,Theodore had a bed. He would walk to the office a couple of hours beforeI myself started on the way, and I was wont to arrive as soon after teno'clock of a morning as I could do conveniently.

  On this memorable occasion of which I am about to tell you--it wasduring the autumn of 1815--I had come to the office unusually early,and had just hung my hat and coat in the outer room, and taken my seatat my desk in the inner office, there to collect my thoughts inpreparation for the grave events which the day might bring forth,when, suddenly, an ill-dressed, dour-looking individual entered theroom without so much as saying, "By your leave," and after havingpushed Theodore--who stood by like a lout--most unceremoniously to oneside. Before I had time to recover from my surprise at this unseemlyintrusion, the uncouth individual thrust Theodore roughly out of theroom, slammed the door in his face, and having satisfied himself thathe was alone with, me and that the door was too solid to allow ofsuccessful eavesdropping, he dragged the best chair forward--the one,sir, which I reserve for lady visitors.

  He threw his leg across it, and, sitting astride, he leaned his elbowsover the back and glowered at me as if he meant to frighten me.

  "My name is Charles Saurez," he said abruptly, "and I want yourassistance in a matter which requires discretion, ingenuity andalertness. Can I have it?"

  I was about to make a dignified reply when he literally threw the nextwords at me: "Name your price, and I will pay it!" he said.

  What could I do, save to raise my shoulders in token that the matterof money was one of supreme indifference to me, and my eyebrows in amanner of doubt that M. Charles Saurez had the means wherewith torepay my valuable services? By way of a rejoinder he took out from theinner pocket of his coat a greasy letter-case, and with hisexceedingly grimy fingers extracted therefrom some twenty banknotes,which a hasty glance on my part revealed as representing a couple ofhundred francs.

  "I will give you this as a retaining fee," he said, "if you willundertake the work I want you to do; and I will double the amountwhen you have carried the work out success fully."

  Four hundred francs! It was not lavish, it was perhaps not altogetherthe price I would have named, but it was vary good, these hard times.You understand? We were all very poor in France in that year 1815 ofwhich I speak.

  I am always quite straightforward when I am dealing with a client whomeans business. I pushed aside the litter of papers in front of me,leaned my elbows upon my desk, rested my chin in my hands, and saidbriefly:

  "M. Charles Saurez, I listen!"

  He drew his chair a little closer and dropped his voice almost to awhisper.

  "You know the Chancellerie of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs?" heasked.

  "Perfectly," I replied.

  "You know M. de Marsan's
private office? He is chief secretary to M.de Talleyrand."

  "No," I said, "but I can find out."

  "It is on the first floor, immediately facing the service staircase,and at the end of the long passage which leads to the main staircase."

  "Easy to find, then," I remarked.

  "Quite. At this hour and until twelve o'clock, M. de Marsan will beoccupied in copying a document which I desire to possess. At eleveno'clock precisely there will be a noisy disturbance in the corridorwhich leads to the main staircase. M. de Marsan, in all probability,will come out of his room to see what the disturbance is about. Willyou undertake to be ready at that precise moment to make a dash fromthe service staircase into the room to seize the document, which nodoubt will be lying on the top of the desk, and bring it to an addresswhich I am about to give you?"

  "It is risky," I mused.

  "Very," he retorted drily, "or I'd do it myself, and not pay you fourhundred francs for your trouble."

  "Trouble!" I exclaimed, with withering sarcasm.

  "Trouble, you call it? If I am caught, it means penalservitude--New Caledonia, perhaps--"

  "Exactly," he said, with the same irritating calmness; "and if yousucceed it means four hundred francs. Take it or leave it, as youplease, but be quick about it. I have no time to waste; it is pastnine o'clock already, and if you won't do the work, someone elsewill."

  For a few seconds longer I hesitated. Schemes, both varied andwild, rushed through my active brain: refuse to take this risk, anddenounce the plot to the police; refuse it, and run to warn M. deMarsan; refuse it, and-- I had little time for reflection. My uncouthclient was standing, as it were, with a pistol to my throat--with apistol and four hundred francs! The police might perhaps give me halfa louis for my pains, or they might possibly remember an unpleasantlittle incident in connexion with the forgery of some Treasury bondswhich they have never succeeded in bringing home to me--one neverknows! M. de Marsan might throw me a franc, and think himself generousat that!

  All things considered, then, when M. Charles Saurez suddenly said,"Well?" with marked impatience, I replied, "Agreed," and within fiveminutes I had two hundred francs in my pocket, with the prospect oftwo hundred more during the next four and twenty hours. I was to havea free hand in conducting my own share of the business, and M. CharlesSaurez was to call for the document at my lodgings at Passy on thefollowing morning at nine o'clock.