"He is determined to thank the emperor for restoring his estates. He might thank the empress, and she wouldn't know what he was talking about. But the emperor knows everything. I have used all the arguments I dared to use against it, but he is a pig for stubbornness. For my sake, for Madame de Ferrier's sake, Lazarre, help me to get him harmlessly out of the Tuileries, without making a public scandal about the restitution of the land!" "What scandal can there be, monsieur? And why shouldn't he thank Napoleon for giving him back his estates after the fortunes of revolution and war?" "Because the emperor didn't do it. I bought them!" "You!" "Yes, I bought them. Come to that, they are my property!" "Madame de Ferrier doesn't know this?" "Certainly not. I meant to settle them on her. Saints and angels, boy, anybody could see what my intentions were!" "Then she is as poor as she was in America?" "Poorer. She has the Marquis de Ferrier!" We two who loved her, youth and man, rich and powerful, or poor and fugitive, felt the passionate need of protecting her. "She wouldn't accept them if she knew it." "Neither would the marquis," said De Chaumont. "The Marquis de Ferrier might live on the estates his lifetime without any interference. But if he will see the emperor, and I can't prevent it any other way, I shall have to tell him!" "Yes, you will have to tell him!" I thought of Eagle in the village, and the old woman who blessed her a quarter of an hour, and Paul standing on the seat to be worshiped. How could I go to America and leave her? And what could I do for her when a rich man like De Chaumont was powerless? "Can't you see Napoleon," I suggested, "and ask him to give the marquis a moment's private audience, and accept his thanks?" "No!" groaned De Chaumont. "He wouldn't do it. I couldn't put myself in such a position!" "If Napoleon came in so hurriedly he may not show himself in the state apartments to-night." "But he is accessible, wherever he is. He doesn't deny himself to the meanest soldier. Why should he refuse to see a noble of the class he is always conciliating when he can?" "Introduce me to the Marquis de Ferrier," I finally said, "and let me see if I can talk against time while you get your emperor out of his way." I thought desperately of revealing to the old royalist what I believed myself to be, what Eagle and he believed me to be, and commanding him, as his rightful prince, to content himself with less effusive and less public gratitude to an usurper. He would live in the country, shrinking so naturally from the court that a self-imposed appearance there need never be repeated. I believe this would have succeeded. A half hour more of time might have saved years of comfort to Eagle--for De Chaumont was generous--and have changed the outcome of my own life. But in scant fifteen minutes our fate was decided.