ssary to summon Vignon, who,
after reflection and negotiation, now had an almost complete list in his
pocket, and seemed likely to perfect a new administration within the next
forty-eight hours.

"Still it isn't settled," resumed Bache. "Well-informed people assert
that Vignon will fail again as he did the first time. For my part I can't
get rid of the idea that Duvillard's gang is pulling the strings, though
for whose benefit is a mystery. You may be quite sure, however, that its
chief purpose is to stifle the African Railways affair. If Monferrand
were not so badly compromised I should almost suspect some trick on his
part. Have you noticed that the 'Globe,' after throwing Barroux overboard
in all haste, now refers to Monferrand every day with the most respectful
sympathy? That's a grave sign; for it isn't Fonsegue's habit to show any
solicitude for the vanquished. But what can one expect from that wretched
Chamber! The only point certain is that something dirty is being plotted
there."

"And that big dunderhead Mege who works for every party except his own!"
exclaimed Morin; "what a dupe he is with that idea that he need merely
overthrow first one cabinet and then another, in order to become the
leader of one himself!"

The mention of Mege brought them all to agreement, for they unanimously
hated him. Bache, although his views coincided on many points with those
of the apostle of State Collectivism, judged each of his speeches, each
of his actions, with pitiless severity. Janzen, for his part, treated the
Collectivist leader as a mere reactionary _bourgeois_, who ought to be
swept away one of the first. This hatred of Mege was indeed the common
passion of Guillaume's friends. They could occasionally show some justice
for men who in no wise shared their ideas; but in their estimation it was
an unpardonable crime for anybody to hold much the same views as
themselves, without being absolutely in agreement with them on every
possible point.

Their discussion continued, their various theories mingling or clashing
till they passed from politics to the press, and grew excited over the
denunciations which poured each morning from Sagnier's newspaper, like
filth from the mouth of a sewer. Thereupon Guillaume, who had become
absorbed in reverie while pacing to and fro according to his habit,
suddenly exclaimed: "Ah! what dirty work it is that Sagnier does! Before
long there won't be a single person, a single thing left on