Bixiou. By the terms of the marriage contract, the widow
Rouget, whose portion of her late husband's property amounted to a
million of francs, secured to her future husband her whole fortune in
case she died without children. No invitations to the wedding were
sent out, nor any "billets de faire part"; Philippe had his designs. He
lodged his wife in an _appartement_ in the rue Saint-Georges, which he
bought ready-furnished from Lolotte. Madame Bridau the younger thought
it delightful, and her husband rarely set foot in it. Without her
knowledge, Philippe purchased in the rue de Clichy, at a time when no
one suspected the value which property in that quarter would one day
acquire, a magnificent hotel for two hundred and fifty thousand francs;
of which he paid one hundred and fifty thousand down, taking two years
to pay the remainder. He spent large sums in altering the interior
and furnishing it; in fact, he put his income for two years into this
outlay. The pictures, now restored, and estimated at three hundred
thousand francs, appeared in such surroundings in all their beauty.

The accession of Charles X. had brought into still greater court favor
the family of the Duc de Chaulieu, whose eldest son, the Duc de Rhetore,
was in the habit of seeing Philippe at Tullia's. Under Charles X., the
elder branch of the Bourbons, believing itself permanently seated on
the throne, followed the advice previously given by Marshal
Gouvion-Saint-Cyr to encourage the adherence of the soldiers of the
Empire. Philippe, who had no doubt made invaluable revelations as to the
conspiracies of 1820 and 1822, was appointed lieutenant-colonel in the
regiment of the Duc de Maufrigneuse. That fascinating nobleman thought
himself bound to protect the man from whom he had taken Mariette. The
corps-de-ballet went for something, therefore, in the appointment.
Moreover, it was decided in the private councils of Charles X., to
give a faint tinge of liberalism to the surroundings of Monseigneur the
Dauphin. Philippe, now a sort of equerry to the Duc de Maufrigneuse, was
presented not only to the Dauphin, but also to the Dauphine, who was not
averse to brusque and soldierly characters who had become noted for a
past fidelity. Philippe thoroughly understood the part the Dauphin had
to play; and he turned the first exhibition of that spurious liberalism
to his own profit, by getting himself appointed aide-de-camp to a
marshal who stood well at court.

In