of Arcis now perceived that Marion had been the agent of Malin in the
purchase of the property, and not of the brothers Simeuse, as was
first supposed. The all-powerful Councillor of State was the most
important personage in Arcis. He had obtained for one of his political
friends the prefecture of Troyes, and for a farmer at Gondreville the
exemption of his son from the draft; in fact, he had done services to
many. Consequently, the sale met with no opposition in the
neighborhood where Malin then reigned, and where he still reigns
supreme.

The Empire was just dawning. Those who in these days read the
histories of the French Revolution can form no conception of the vast
spaces which public thought traversed between events which now seem to
have been so near together. The strong need of peace and tranquillity
which every one felt after the violent tumults of the Revolution
brought about a complete forgetfulness of important anterior facts.
History matured rapidly under the advance of new and eager interests.
No one, therefore, except Michu, looked into the past of this affair,
which the community accepted as a simple matter. Marion, who had
bought Gondreville for six hundred thousand francs in assignats, sold
it for the value of a couple of million in coin; but the only payments
actually made by Malin were for the costs of registration. Grevin, a
seminary comrade of Malin, assisted the transaction, and the
Councillor rewarded his help with the office of notary at Arcis. When
the news of the sale reached the pavilion, brought there by a farmer
whose farm, at Grouage, was situated between the forest and the park
on the left of the noble avenue, Michu turned pale and left the house.
He lay in wait for Marion, and finally met him alone in one of the
shrubberies of the park.