The Kill

All of Baron Gouraud is summed up in this brief biography: made a baron by Napoleon I for supplying the Grand Army with spoiled rations, he was a peer under Louis XVIII, Charles X, and Louis-Philippe21 in succession and became a senator under Napoleon III. He was a worshiper of the throne, of four gilt boards covered with velvet; the man who happened to sit on it mattered little to him. With his enormous belly, bovine face, and elephantine gait, he proved to be a charming rogue. He sold himself in the most majestic ma

M. Toutin-Laroche, a tall, thin man known for having invented a mixture of suet and stearin used in the manufacture of candles, dreamed of becoming a senator. He stuck to Baron Gouraud like a leech, rubbing up against him with the idea that this would somehow bring him luck. At bottom he was a very pragmatic man, and had he found a senate seat for sale he would have haggled ferociously over the price. The Empire was about to make a celebrity of this greedy nonentity, this narrow-minded entrepreneur with a genius for shady industrial deals. He was the first to sell his name to a dubious company, one of those corporations that sprang up like poisonous mushrooms on the dung heap of imperial speculation. Some time ago a poster could be seen glued to the walls of Paris and bearing the following words in big black letters: SOCIÉTÉ GÉNÉRALE DES PORTS DU MAROC. It featured the name of M. Toutin-Laroche together with his title as municipal councilor at the head of a list of members of the board of directors, each more obscure than the next so far as the general public was concerned. This technique, much abused since, worked wonders. People rushed to buy stock in the company, even though a great deal remained unclear about what was to be done with the “ports of Morocco,” and the good people who invested their money could not themselves explain what project it was to be used for. The poster offered a superb description of commercial stations to be established along the Mediterranean coast. For two years previously, certain newspapers had been singing the praises of this ambitious venture, which every three months they reported to be prospering as never before. At the municipal council, M. Toutin-Laroche enjoyed a reputation as a top-flight administrator. He was one of the big thinkers of the group, and the harsh tyra

Saccard won the protection of these two personages by doing them favors, the importance of which he shrewdly pretended not to notice. He introduced his sister to the baron, who was mixed up at the time in a most unsavory affair. He took her to the baron’s house on the pretext of soliciting his support for Mme Sidonie’s long-standing effort to obtain a contract to supply the Tuileries with draperies. After they spent some time alone together, however, it turned out that it was she who promised the baron to negotiate with certain individuals ill-ma

“You’ll be in on it,” he mumbled. “You’ve got to be in on it.”

Saccard was at his best throughout these maneuvers. He was prudent enough not to make Baron Gouraud and M. Toutin-Laroche each other’s accomplices. He visited them separately and whispered in each man’s ear a word in favor of one of his friends whose property on the rue de la Pépinière was about to be taken by eminent domain. He was careful to tell each of his two cronies that he would not breathe a word about this business to any other member of the commission, that it was all still up in the air, and that he was counting most especially on the help of whichever one he was speaking to.

The clerk was right to be wary and take precautions. When the dossier on his building came before the indemnity commission, it turned out that one of the members lived on the rue d’Astorg and knew the house. This man objected to the figure of 500,000 francs, which he said ought to be reduced by more than half. Aristide had been impudent enough to ask for 700,000. That day, M. Toutin-Laroche, who was normally extremely unpleasant to his colleagues, was in an even fouler mood than usual. He became incensed and took up the defense of property owners.

“We all own property, gentlemen. The emperor is out to do great things. Let’s not haggle over trifles. . . . This house ought to be worth 500,000 francs. The figure was set by one of our own people, an employee of city hall. . . . You’d think we were living in a den of thieves. Keep this up and we’ll end up being suspicious of one another.”

Baron Gouraud, sunk deep in his chair, glanced with surprise out of the corner of his eye at M. Toutin-Laroche fulminating on behalf of the owner of the rue de la Pépinière property. A suspicion crossed his mind. But since Toutin-Laroche’s vehement diatribe made it u

“Yes, of course,” the baron added gravely. “Our decisions must be beyond reproach.”

The file had already vanished into M. Toutin-Laroche’s ample pockets. The commission was obliged to go along. On the way out, the two accomplices met on the quay and looked at each other without cracking a smile. They sensed that they were in this together, which only added to their poise. Men of commoner stamp would have insisted on explaining themselves, but these two continued to argue the case for property owners, as if the others could still hear them, and to deplore the distrustful attitude that was becoming so ubiquitous.

As they were about to part, the baron paused for a moment and smiled. “Oh, I almost forgot, but I’ll be leaving shortly for the country. Would you be kind enough, my dear colleague, to conduct this little inquiry without me? . . . And whatever you do, please don’t give away my secret: those fellows are always complaining that I take too many vacations.”

“Don’t trouble yourself about it,” Toutin-Laroche replied. “I shall go at once to the rue de la Pépinière.”

He quietly returned home, feeling a twinge of admiration for the baron, who had such clever ways of extricating himself from ticklish situations. He kept the file in his pocket and at the next meeting of the commission a