the champion of the Church, and enabled
him to dispose of his sacred unsaleable stock. Though he was virtually
illiterate and could not even spell correctly, he himself wrote the
articles of the "Gazette" with a humility and rancour that compensated
for his lack of talent. The marquis, in entering on the campaign, had
perceived immediately the advantage that might be derived from the
co-operation of this insipid sacristan with the coarse, mercenary pen.
After the February Revolution the articles in the "Gazette" contained
fewer mistakes; the marquis revised them.

One can now imagine what a singular spectacle the Rougons' yellow
drawing-room presented every evening. All opinions met there to bark at
the Republic. Their hatred of that institution made them agree together.
The marquis, who never missed a meeting, appeased by his presence the
little squabbles which occasionally arose between the commander and
the other adherents. These plebeians were inwardly flattered by the
handshakes which he distributed on his arrival and departure. Roudier,
however, like a free-thinker of the Rue Saint-Honore, asserted that the
marquis had not a copper to bless himself with, and was disposed to make
light of him. M. de Carnavant on his side preserved the amiable smile of
a nobleman lowering himself to the level of these middle class people,
without making any of those contemptuous grimaces which any other
resident of the Saint-Marc quarter would have thought fit under such
circumstances. The parasite life he had led had rendered him supple. He
was the life and soul of the group, commanding in the name of unknown
personages whom he never revealed. "They want this, they don't want
that," he would say. The concealed divinities who thus watched over
the destinies of Plassans from behind some cloud, without appearing to
interfere directly in public matters, must have been certain priests,
the great political agents of the country. When the marquis pronounced
that mysterious word "they," which inspired the assembly with such
marvellous respect, Vuillet confessed, with a gesture of pious devotion,
that he knew them very well.

The happiest person in all this was Felicite. At last she had people
coming to her drawing-room. It was true she felt a little ashamed of her
old yellow velvet furniture. She consoled herself, however, thinking
of the rich things she would purchase when the good cause should have
triumphed. The Rougons had, in the end