went to the Tuileries to get his cue. And he always waited for the
minister's return from the Chamber, if in session, to hear from him
what intrigue or manoeuvre he was to set about. This official sybarite
dressed, dined, and visited a dozen or fifteen salons between eight at
night and three in the morning. At the opera he talked with journalists,
for he stood high in their favor; a perpetual exchange of little
services went on between them; he poured into their ears his misleading
news and swallowed theirs; he prevented them from attacking this or that
minister on such or such a matter, on the plea that it would cause real
pain to their wives or their mistresses.

"Say that his bill is worth nothing, and prove it if you can, but do
not say that Mariette danced badly. The devil! haven't we all played
our little plays; and which of us knows what will become of him in times
like these? You may be minister yourself to-morrow, you who are spicing
the cakes of the 'Constitutionel' to-day."

Sometimes, in return, he helped editors, or got rid of obstacles to the
performances of some play; gave gratuities and good dinners at the
right moment, or promised his services to bring some affair to a happy
conclusion. Moreover, he really liked literature and the arts; he
collected autographs, obtained splendid albums gratis, and possessed
sketches, engravings, and pictures. He did a great deal of good to
artists by simply not injuring them and by furthering their wishes
on certain occasions when their self-love wanted some rather costly
gratification. Consequently, he was much liked in the world of actors
and actresses, journalists and artists. For one thing, they had the
same vices and the same indolence as himself. Men who could all say such
witty things in their cups or in company with a danseuse, how could they
help being friends? If des Lupeaulx had not been a general-secretary
he would certainly have been a journalist. Thus, in that fifteen years'
struggle in which the harlequin sabre of epigram opened a breach by
which insurrection entered the citadel, des Lupeaulx never received so
much as a scratch.

As the young fry of clerks looked at this man playing bowls in the
gardens of the ministry with the minister's children, they cracked
their brains to guess the secret of his influence and the nature of his
services; while, on the other hand, the aristocrats in all the various
ministries looked upon him as a dangerous Mephistoph