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benefit performances, tickets of all colors, "platform, front row, reserved sections." The Nabob's orders were that no one should be refused, and it was a decided gain that he no longer attended to such matters in person. For a long time he had deluged all this hypocritical scheming with gold, with lordly indifference, paying five hundred francs for a ticket to a concert by some Wurtemberg zither-player, or Languedocian flutist, which would have been quoted at ten francs at the Tuileries or the Due de Mora's. On some days young de Gery went out from these sessions actually nauseated. All his youthful honesty rose in revolt; he attempted to induce the Nabob to institute some reforms; but he, at the first word, assumed the bored expression characteristic of weak natures when called upon to give an opinion, or else replied with a shrug of his great shoulders: "Why this is Paris, my dear child. Don't you be alarmed, but just let me alone. I know where I'm going and what I want." He wanted two things at that time,--a seat in the Chamber of Deputies and the cross of the Legion of Honor. In his view those were the first two stages of the long ascent which his ambition impelled him to undertake. He certainly would be chosen a deputy through the _Caisse Territoriale_, at the head of which he was. Paganetti from Porto-Vecchio often said to him: "When the day comes, the island will rise as one man and vote for you." But electors were not the only thing it was necessary to have; there must be a vacant seat in the Chamber, and the delegation from Corsica was full. One member, however, old Popolasca, being infirm and in no condition to perform his duties, might be willing to resign on certain conditions. It was a delicate matter to negotiate, but quite practicable, for the good man had a large family, estates which produced almost nothing, a ruined palace at Bastia, where his children lived on _polenta_, and an apartment at Paris, in a furnished lodging-house of the eighteenth order. By not haggling over one or two hundred thousand francs, they might come to terms with that famished legislator who, when sounded by Paganetti, did not say yes or no, being allured by the magnitude of the sum but held back by the vainglory of his office. The affair was in that condition and might be decided any day. With regard to the Cross, the prospect was even brighter. The Work of Bethlehem had certainly created a great sensation at the Tuile
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