After explaining the rest of the matter to Charles, Joseph Bonaparte also quit directly. Charles politely sent him to the door of the small mansion. Before leaving, he confessed a word to Charles, and his expression looked very satisfied with the harvest of the night.

"Charles, I'm coming to France this time, and I've done everything I need to do, and I'll leave the rest to you. It's up to you! He patted Charles on the shoulder as a gesture of kindness, "My cousin and I have absolute confidence in your abilities. ”

"Xiexie, you're giving me a favor." Charles replied respectfully, and then watched a contented Joseph Bonaparte leave.

Charles watched Joseph Bonaparte's back with a blank face until he was sure that he had disappeared into the darkness of the street corner, and then he slowly withdrew his gaze.

It was early in the morning, but Charles was not tired.

Although it was late autumn at this time, the temperature of the night had dropped a lot, but Charles, who was relatively thinly dressed, did not notice it, he slowly walked back to the place where the three of them had gathered, and then sat back quietly in his place, thinking about everything he had experienced tonight.

The arrogant and conceited speech of the banker Baron Beauvois still ringed in his ears at this time, both arrogant and resolute, and made Charles deeply feel the liliang of the French financiers of this era.

His Jihua Charr could not stop it, and had no intention of stopping it, and even simply agreed to participate in it, to share a little of the leftovers left over from the bank, and was willingly bought by the bankers. He had now abandoned the knee-jerk hesitation which Baron Beauwan had derided as a "ridiculous moral obstacle"—and he knew that his position at this time could only be taken this way, and he did not regret it.

And Joseph Bonaparte had just been talking to himself triumphantly and smugly about the "art of domination" and the "art of imperialism." Until now, it was still hovering in Charles's mind, and he couldn't help but have a little bitter smile and a little contempt in his heart.

Yes. Perhaps because the genius uncle's stubbornness and arbitrariness caused the Zuihou people to rebel and leave their relatives and the lesson of the collapse of the empire was too profound, the next generation of the Bonaparte family paid special attention to playing with power, and they were afraid that if they were not careful, they would ruin the empire that they had won back with great difficulty.

To some extent, they can be said to be guided by Machiavelli's teachings, and thus are too skillful and flexible, but lack a real "purpose".

This characteristic was even more vividly reflected in the future reign of Napoleon III.

In later imperial rule. On the surface, his administration had the "republican" flavor of the early Enlightenment, and he was even denounced by some opponents as a "republican with a crown". In his dynasty, it can be said that the government with the largest number of referendums in all European countries at that time. His greatest passion. It is to play himself as "the executor of the will of the people", "the friend of the people", and "the merciful emperor of the French people".

In reality, however, he secretly pursues an extremely deceitful way of governing, using the façade of "popular will" to pursue his delusional (and sometimes even fanciful) policies, which are completely different from what he says. What you do today is often different from what you did yesterday. As a result, people often scratch their heads and wonder if he is really smart or confused.

Former British Prime Minister Palmerston once secretly ridiculed him: "The ideas in his head multiply as quickly as a nest of rabbits." ”

Ideas multiply like rabbits, but often miss the point, which was the biggest shortcoming of Napoleon III.

To be sure, a ruler sometimes had to have some power to govern the country, and in that sense, Napoleon III was indeed a great man.

But. The goal of politicians playing power tricks should not be for the power tricks themselves, but for the purpose of using power tricks to consolidate their political position and implement the statecraft policies they want to pursue. Napoleon III did a good job of manipulating political intrigue and power tricks to check and balance his ministers. However, when there is a real hard confrontation between countries, national strength is the most basic and important weight.

The tragedy of Napoleon III is that in the second half of the 19th century, he still only wanted to play Machiavelli, although sometimes it was necessary to play, but purely relying on the power trick Zuihou Nasan had to play a defeat in front of the surging German army of millions and the end of the empire (of course, Bismarck himself was also a master of playing with power, which does not need to be repeated).

But unfortunately, no one knows what these will happen in the future except the traverser.

Thus, the future Prince Joseph-Bonaparte could boast of the "art of domination" in front of the Charles, and wanted to make the Tréville family his loyal men.

At the thought of this, Charles couldn't help but laugh again, but soon he couldn't laugh anymore, and he was wisely aware of a much more serious problem, one that had to be worried.

He will get rich because of this decision of the Bonaparte, but he will also become a "villain" in the eyes of the people because of this decision of the Bonaparte family - although this is true, but the biggest barrier of the villain is to hide in the sun like Baron Beauvan, and it is never a good thing to rashly become the target of public criticism.

What did Joseph Bonaparte say?

"We must ascend to the throne with a clean slate, and we must reign in France with a clear conscience. It is only the evil servants of the emperor who knock out the bones and suck the marrow of the people, not the emperor himself. ”

So who will be this "evil servant of the emperor"?

can only be the traitor Trevile, the evil Boss Xia, don't even think about avoiding these titles.

Charles is not worried about bad reputation, what bad reputation would a bourgeois fighter be afraid of?

What he was worried about was such a dilemma -- would such a traitorous minister with a bad reputation Trevier become a victim of the emperor's power tricks in the future? Will it become a tool for the emperor to calm public opinion?

He put himself in his shoes and thought about it, then came to a conclusion.

Yes.

In the future, when the decision to sacrifice the Shire is made if it is necessary. Will the power-tricked Bonapartes, who had never met yet, or Joseph Bonaparte, whom he had met several times and become good allies, hesitate for a few more seconds for the Tréville family's years of loyalty?

Charles continued to put himself in his shoes for a moment. And then the same conclusions were drawn.

There may be some hesitation, but it will only be a few seconds at most.

Did a few seconds of hesitation on the part of the Bonaparte family be of any value to Charles de Treville?

No, it doesn't make any sense.

He gave himself a straight answer.

In all fairness, it's too early to worry about the situation. No matter how outrageous the Bonaparte family is, it still needs "loyal" supporters like Charles to support it. Won't be ugly before this. And after coming to power, no matter what, you still have to give these supporters some carrots first. lest the hearts of those who support themselves be in high places. So, in the near future, what Charles feared probably won't happen.

But what if you take into account the forward?

Reason told Charles. In the long run, there is a good chance that this will happen.

At least Charles himself did not have the confidence to gamble his own glory and wealth on the future of the Bonaparte family.

Therefrom. Charles also strengthened his previous determination not to completely rely on loyalty to the Bonaparte family, but to make some other preparations for his future sooner. At least to the point where the Bonapartes would not be able to abandon them at will.

However, in any case, there is no contradiction between "planning for yourself" and "making a fortune first", and it can even be said that the latter is a necessary condition for the former. Moreover, the trust of the Bonaparte family was still indispensable to the Charr at this time. So the banker Jihua, Charles thought that he should not only participate. And you should do it well and try to accumulate more capital for your future.

Even if the worst happens. At least it's better to have a lot of money when you abscond than no money at all, right? Charles had no interest in learning to repair shoes in a foreign country for ten years like his grandfather - well, that's a joke......

In this way, in the cool breeze of late autumn, Xia Erhao Haode sorted out his current situation, then thought about the future and made a decision for the future.

Then he walked out of the small courtyard, and then walked a few dozen meters along the rather dilapidated street, and came to the mouth of a deep alley.

"Albert, come out, I'm fine!" He called out softly.

Charles's friend, Albert de Foa-Grass, slowly emerged from the depths of the alley.

Seeing that Charles had come alone, and that he was fully dressed, he smiled lightly.

"My friend, it looks like you're just making a false alarm."

"Yes, a false alarm." Charles nodded.

Fearing that Baron Beauwan had laid some trap for himself and secretly tricked himself, Charles not only brought someone with him when he was pre-arranged, but also secretly placed Albert as a helper for safety - although Charles felt that Baron Beauvang would not do this, it was still not wrong to be cautious.

And Albert was really interesting enough, as soon as he heard that it was a request for Charles's life, he immediately followed Charles here without saying a word, and waited quietly in the cool breeze for several hours. However, even if he had come to do such a thing, he was still dressed elegantly tonight, as if he were attending some kind of banquet. What a playboy professionalism......

Two young men slowly left the neighborhood along the street.

"That Mr. Andrei Bezukhov really has some tricks, and yesterday he told me that he had sent things to Russia, and it seems that he will make a fortune this time." Albert suddenly muttered, "This guy is so happy now, he invited us to a lesson yesterday." ”

"It's okay, Albert, I'll be rich soon." Charles replied in a low voice, "And then you'll have money soon." ”

"Really?" Albert replied noncommittally, "I hope so." ”

It has to be.

Instead of continuing the topic, Charles reversed course. "My friend, how about we go to Monsieur de Lefre's for dinner tomorrow?"

"Okay!" Albert responded, "I had a great time eating that day, it was delicious, I missed it." (To be continued......)