reat thing was to get
round Marat, to secure his good will against the day when he should be
dictator--and everything pointed to this consummation,--his popularity,
his ambition, his eagerness to recommend heroic measures. And it might
be, after all, Marat would re-establish order, the finances, the
prosperity of the country. More than once he had risen in revolt
against the zealots who were for outbidding him in fanaticism; for some
time past he had been denouncing the demagogues as vehemently as the
moderates. After inciting the people to sack the "cornerers'" shops and
hang them over their own counters, he was now exhorting the citizens to
be calm and prudent. He was growing into an administrator.

In spite of certain rumours disseminated against him as against all the
other chiefs of the Revolution, these pirates of the money-market did
not believe he could be corrupted, but they did know him to be vain and
credulous, and they hoped to win him over by flattery and still more by
a condescending friendliness which they looked upon as the most
seductive form of flattery from men like themselves. They counted,
thanks to him, on blowing hot and cold on all the securities they might
wish to buy and sell, and making him serve their interests while
supposing himself to be acting solely for the public good.

Great as a go-between, albeit she was still of an age for amours on her
own account, the _citoyenne_ Rochemaure had made it her mission to bring
together the legislator-journalist and the banker, and in her
extravagant imagination she already saw the man of the underworld, the
man whose hands were yet red with the blood of the September massacres,
a partner in the game of the financiers whose agent she was; she
pictured him drawn by his very warmth of feeling and unsophisticated
candour into the whirlpool of speculation, a recruit to the coterie she
loved of "corner" makers, contractors, foreign emissaries, gamblers, and
women of gallantry.

She insisted on the _citoyen_ Gamelin taking her to see the Friend of
the People, who lived quite near, in the Rue des Cordeliers, near the
church. After some little show of reluctance, the painter acceded to the
_citoyenne's_ wishes.

The dragoon Henry was invited to join them in the visit, but declined,
declaring he meant to keep his liberty of action, even towards the
_citoyen_ Marat, who, he felt no doubt, had rendered services to the
Republic, but was weakening nowadays; had