of Baron Beust that actually deceived the _Revue des Deux Mondes_ and
caused quite a panic at the Tuileries. He had established such relations
with foreign journals that he could at any moment command insertion for
a paper, now in the _Mémorial Diplomatique_, now in the _Golos_ of St.
Petersburg, or the _Allgemeine Zeitung_; while the comment, written also
by himself, would appear in the _Kreuz Zeitung_ or the _Times_; and the
mystification became such that the shrewdest and keenest heads were
constantly misled, to which side to incline in a controversy where all the
wires were pulled by one hand. Many a discussion on the authenticity of a
document, or the veracity of a conversation, would take place between the
two young men; Kearney not having the vaguest suspicion that the author of
the point in debate was then sitting opposite to him, sometimes seeming to
share the very doubts and difficulties that were then puzzling himself.

While Atlee knew Kearney in every fold and fibre of his nature, Kearney had
not the very vaguest conception of him with whom he sat every day at meals,
and communed through almost every hour of his life. He treated Joe, indeed,
with a sort of proud protection, thinking him a sharp, clever, idle fellow,
who would never come to anything higher than a bookseller's hack or an
'occasional correspondent.' He liked his ready speech, and his fun, but he
would not consent to see in either evidences of anything beyond the amusing
qualities of a very light intelligence. On the whole, he looked down upon
him, as very properly the slow and ponderous people in life do look down
upon their more volatile brethren, and vote them triflers. Long may it be
so! There would be more sunstrokes in the world, if it were not that the
shadows of dull men made such nice cool places for the others to walk in!