Page:Napoleon (O'Connor 1896).djvu/147

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The Estimate of an Official.
131

me whatever, and yet, on her mere word, they ventured to compromise themselves in the most dangerous fashion, so as to get me out of my difficulty. Thus did I reap the fruit of a few slight services rendered by my people in other days."

"I had just secured one of the precious certificates of residence which I had so eagerly sought. It had been granted to me by the General Assembly of the section, held in the church of the Trinité. I was about to depart when a little man approached me, and drew me aside under the pretence of saying a few words. I followed him without fear, believing him one of the witnesses procured on my behalf whom I did not know. He turned out to be a member of the Revolutionary Committee, and without further ado he handed me over to a guard close by. The latter was ordered to take me before the Committee, and I remained in his custody until the members of it had assembled. No sooner had I been questioned than it became an easy matter for them to elicit the fact that I was an ex-Councillor of the Paris Parliament, and that my father was already under arrest. There was consequently no room for doubt that I was a good capture, and I was notified, in spite of all my protestations, that I was to be taken to the Luxembourg prison."