Combray family; France -- History -- Consulate and First Empire, 1799-1815
This signal favour rallied many to the Combrays. Denunciations of Acquet
and his friends were heard on all sides. The letters written at this
period from Bonnoeil to his brother testify to the astonishment they
felt at these revelations. They made a fresh discovery every day. "M.
Bruslard told me the other day that La Vaubadon wished to have him
arrested, but that he took care not to fall into the trap she had set
for him." "With regard to Licquet, he knew d'Ache well and had made up
to him before the affair with Georges, believing at that time that there
would be a change of government." "It is quite certain that it was
Senator Pontecoulant who had d'Ache killed; Frotte's death was partly
due to him." "With regard to Acquet, M. de Rivoire told Placene that he
had been seen in the temple about six years ago, and that every one
there considered him a spy and an informer...."
Thus, little by little Mme. de Combray arrived at the conclusion that
all her misfortunes had been caused by her enemies' hatred. In 1815 a
biographer published a life of the Marquise, which was preceded by a
dedication to herself which she had evidently dictated, and which placed
her high up in the list of royalist martyrs.
This halo pleased her immensely. She was present at the fetes given at
the Rouen prefecture, where she walked triumphantly--still holding
herself very erect and wearing lilies in her hair--through the very
halls into which she had once been dragged handcuffed by Savoye-Rollin's
gaolers. At dinners where she was an honoured guest she would recount,
with astonishing calmness, her impressions of the pillory and the
prisons. She sent a confidential agent to Donnay "to obtain news of the
Sieur Acquet," who was not at all satisfied and by no means at ease, as
we can well imagine. It was said that he had sent for his sister to come
and take care of his three children, the eldest of whom was nearly
twenty years of age. Acquet pretended to be ill in order to defer his
departure from Donnay. He finally quitted Normandy early in the autumn
of 1814, taking with him his three daughters, "whom he counted on
marrying off in his own home." "He is without house or home," wrote Mme.
de Combray, "and possesses nothing but the shame by which he is
covered." Acquet de Ferolles settled at Saint-Hilaire-de-Tulmont, where
he died on April 6th, 1815.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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