It so happened that a few days afterwards the elder of the children asked Julien, in M. de Renal's presence, about a book which had been advertised in the Quotidienne.
"In order to prevent the Jacobin Party having the slightest pretext for a score," said the young tutor, "and yet give me the means of answering M. de Adolphe's question, you can make your most menial servant take out a subscription at the booksellers."
"That's not a bad idea," said M. de Rênal, who was obviously very delighted.
"You will have to stipulate all the same," said Julien in that solemn and almost melancholy manner which suits some people so well when they see the realization of matters which they have desired for a long time past, "you will have to stipulate that the servant should not take out any novels. Those dangerous books, once they got into the house, might corrupt Madame de Rênal's maids, and even the servant himself."
"You are forgetting the political pamphlets," went on M. de Renal with an important air. He was anxious to conceal the admiration with which the cunning "middle course" devised by his children's tutor had filled him.
In this way Julien's life was made up of a series of little acts of diplomacy, and their success gave him far more food for thought than the marked manifestation of favouritism which he could have read at any time in Madame de Rênal's heart, had he so wished.
The psychological position in which he had found himself all his life was renewed again in the mayor of Verrière's house. Here in the same way as at his father's saw-mill, he deeply despised the people with whom he lived, and was hated by them. He saw every day in the conversation of the subperfect, M. Valenod and the other friends of the family, about things which had just taken place under their very eyes, how little ideas corresponded to reality. If an action seemed to Julien worthy of admiration, it was precisely that very action which would bring down upon itself the censure of the people with whom he lived. His inner mental reply always was, "What beasts or what fools!" The joke was that, in spite of all his pride, he often understood absolutely nothing what they were talking about.
