rible men.'

'I have my star, Josephine,' said Napoleon, patting her upon the head.
'I see my own career lying before me and I know exactly what I am
destined to do. Nothing can harm me until my work is accomplished.
The Arabs are believers in Fate, and the Arabs are in the right.'

'Then why should you plan, Napoleon, if everything is to be decided by
Fate?'

'Because it is fated that I should plan, you little stupid. Don't you
see that that is part of Fate also, that I should have a brain which is
capable of planning. I am always building behind a scaffolding, and no
one can see what I am building until I have finished. I never look
forward for less than two years, and I have been busy all morning,
Monsieur de Laval, in planning out the events which will occur in the
autumn and winter of 1807. By the way, that good-looking cousin of
yours appears to have managed this affair very cleverly. She is a very
fine girl to be wasted upon such a creature as the Lucien Lesage who has
been screaming for mercy for a week past. Do you not think that it is a
great pity?'

I acknowledged that I did.

'It is always so with women--ideologists, dreamers, carried away by
whims and imaginings. They are like the Easterns, who cannot conceive
that a man is a fine soldier unless he has a formidable presence.
I could not get the Egyptians to believe that I was a greater general
than Kleber, because he had the body of a porter and the head of a
hair-dresser. So it is with this poor creature Lesage, who will be made
a hero by women because he has an oval face and the eyes of a calf.
Do you imagine that if she were to see him in his true colours it would
turn her against him?'

'I am convinced of it, sire. From the little that I have seen of my
cousin I am sure that no one could have a greater contempt for cowardice
or for meanness.'

'You speak warmly, sir. You are not by chance just a little touched
yourself by this fair cousin of yours?'

'Sire, I have already told you--'

'Ta, ta, ta, but she is across the water, and many things have happened
since then.'

Constant had entered the room.

'He has been admitted, sire.'

'Very good. We shall move into the next room. Josephine, you shall
come too, for it is your business rather than mine.'

The room into which we passed was a long, narrow one. There were two
windows at one side, but the curtains had been drawn almost across, so
that the light was not very good.