In a small roadside café, Arthur sat down by the window and ordered a random French dessert like baked brie, croissant, and Mont Blanc.

Not long after the dessert was served, Arthur saw a large gentleman with shiny oily hair push open the door of the café.

Wind chimes fluttered, followed by the sound of Arthur raising his hand in greeting.

"Mr. Coconut Tree, I haven't seen you for so long, but you are still as young and beautiful as ever."

When the coconut tree saw Arthur, he came over with a small leather bag, and he joked to himself, "Fortunately, you came here alone, and if I had to see your friend again, I would have to let him rub my pectoralis major muscles." ”

After the coconut tree said this, he saw a few small desserts on the table: "You are quite bothered, but to be honest, these little desserts taste good." But the meal I miss the most is when I used to have no good days, and I finished my work every day and found a low-class tavern with old fellows to eat those pies that were still stained with plant ash. ”

Arthur wasn't in a hurry to cut to the chase either.

Ever since he met with Mr. Vidocq, he had been trying to recruit the legendary detective and his team.

Although the Criminal Investigation Department of Scotland Yard has completed the process of starting from scratch in the hands of Arthur, when it comes to the use and management of the detective department, there should be no better than Vidocq in this world.

And over the course of his correspondence with Vidocq for more than a year, Arthur's respect for the old French gentleman in his fifties has continued to grow.

Whether it is the modern policing techniques pioneered by Vidocq, such as ballistics and physical evidence, or the Parisian plainclothes detective team that easily puts Parisian dissidents under surveillance by his subordinates, or the secret files of the security department that records all the underground criminal organizations in Paris, it is something that Arthur covets.

It can be said that if Vidocq is willing to come to London to find another job, Arthur can now delegate the command of the Criminal Investigation Department to the grandfather of the detective industry.

Perhaps for the officers of the Grand Paris Police Agency, a capable and restless guy like Vidocq is a headache.

But for Arthur, the rootless duckweed of Scotland Yard, it was a good thing to watch Vidocq grow big in Scotland Yard. After all, on his own, it is really difficult for him to compete with the original shares of Scotland Yard - the senior police officers from the army.

He just went to Liverpool, and Director Rowan almost boiled his old nest.

If it weren't for the Home Secretary, the Viscount of Melbourne, who took into account Lord Breham's feelings, perhaps Arthur would have been able to move his forward position from Scotland Yard to the newly established London District Prosecutor's Office with his bag in a while.

However, as the old saying goes, there is no sixty-year-old prince in the world, so naturally there can be no sixty-year-old justice.

Although Lord Brougham is ostensibly comfortable in the position of Lord Chancellor, those who are familiar with Britain's political landscape know that a radical like Broughham cannot stay in high positions for long under normal circumstances.

The reason why he could become a justice at this time was only an expedient measure by the Whigs to push for parliamentary reform and consolidate their ruling position.

This is true not only of Lord Broughham, but also of the present Prime Minister, Earl Grey.

Once the parliamentary reform is complete, and the two radicals continue to push for other liberalization reforms, it won't be long before the position is replaced.

And with Arthur's understanding of Lord Broughham, it is clear that his mentor is not an easy character to compromise.

So, if you want to be invincible in turbulent times, there are only two reliable paths to choose from.

One is to maintain a good relationship with both parties at the same time, and it is undoubtedly foolish for them, the officers in charge of choosing sides, to take sides firmly.

That being said, it is not easy to maintain good relations with both parties at the same time. If you don't do it well, it is likely that both sides will not please you, and you will end up in a situation where you will be attacked by a group.

And in order to solve this problem, you have to spend some time to build your own basic disk. As long as the fundamentals are solid, both the Whigs and the Tories must weigh whether the gains outweigh the losses before they do so.

In other words, Arthur had to have some reason why the big guys couldn't replace him, a little good work, some good social reputation, and preferably a few trivial personal connections.

Vidocq, on the other hand, can help Arthur solve the first problem.

"It was a wonderful time, when we were all young," Coconut recalls. The boss was not called Vidocq yet, he preferred to use a pseudonym to run errands, like 'Jean Louis' or 'Julius' or something.

I remember the first time the boss took us on a mission, we were standing on the street in front of his Rue de San Francos residence, smoking cigarettes, when we noticed a couple of guys carrying bulky packages coming out of the alley.

But as soon as they came out, they spotted us and turned back again, as if to hide from the lights and pedestrians outside. We were about to go up and interrogate us, but the leader stopped us as soon as he stretched out his hand, and he told us not to startle the snake. Let's keep up first, these poisonous snakes will definitely come out of the hole again eventually.

As soon as we followed, we heard someone behind us shouting the pseudonym 'Jean Louis'. We turned our heads and saw that it was Frost, a gentleman on the beam that we had befriended when we were still mixing on the road.

The other thieves found out that they were acquaintances, so they all got out of their hideouts, and everyone smoked together and handed out fires to call each other brothers. The thieves told us that the police seemed to have targeted them. The boss then offered to let us go ahead and find the way for them, and when the bastards heard this, they thanked him with all his mother's might, saying, 'Everyone on the road says that Jean-Louis preaches morality, and today I saw that it was true.'

They took us all the way to the lumber yard on San Sebastian Road, where we kept the stolen goods first. Later, Frost offered to take the leader with him to negotiate with him, saying, 'I don't have a good name, but if Jean Louis goes with me, the price will definitely be higher than usual.'

Frost, the fool, was afraid that the leader would not agree, so he promised that if the agreement was completed, he would give us thirty percent. As a result, the boss swaggered and followed Frost to the stolen goods den, and gave the place a pot. ”

When Arthur heard this, he couldn't help but ask: "Mr. Vidocq did this once or twice, and there are many people who have been arrested, don't the people in the back of the road still know his true identity?" ”

The coconut tree grabbed a croissant and replied while eating.

"Those people only know that Vidocq, a thief arresting expert, has recently come to the Grand Paris Police Agency, but there are only a few who have actually seen what Vidocq looks like. In the minds of the Parisian thugs, 'Jean-Louis' and 'Julius' are still well-known connoisseurs.

Moreover, the boss has a long plan in terms of identity, and every time he appears as 'Jean Louis' and 'Julius', he will be arrested with the thugs. In order to trap prisoners, he often placed himself in the same cell as mortals. Once met a guy who was too cautious, he even arranged a scene to rescue him from the class, and the end result was of course widely acclaimed. ”

When Arthur heard this, he smiled meaningfully and replied, "Now I can finally understand why Mr. Vidocq was able to reduce the crime rate in Paris by forty percent in the first year of the establishment of the Ministry of Security. From this point of view, it was really a bad decision to squeeze him out from behind the Grand Paris Police Department. ”

The coconut tree tore off a slice of bread and threw it into his mouth, leaned back in his chair and rolled his eyes, "That's not just their wrong decision. Moreover, the methods they used to force the leader to resign back then were also really done. ”

"You mean the cloak thing?"

"Not only that, but before that, they had sent people to spread a lot of disgusting fake news in Paris."

The coconut tree was furious at the thought of those things: "Tell me the truth, Monsieur Hastings, you know, I am a gentleman, a French gentleman, romantic by nature, and very fond of making love with ladies. I was in Paris with my boss, so once I had some savings, I started to focus on my relationships......"

Arthur took a sip of the teacup: "Mr. Coconut Tree, you don't have to go to great lengths to lay the groundwork, just say that you have a few lovers, I understand what you mean." ”

The coconut tree laughed and said, "At this point, you really don't look like an Englishman, but frankly almost an Italian." Yes, I have a lover, a charming Jewish girl, and I have been thinking about her since I was 20 years old.

But at that time, I was a thief who didn't eat the last meal, and I was from a serious family, so naturally there was no possibility. But then it was different, I became an important member of the security department, and I had money and status, so our relationship developed rapidly.

But what I didn't expect was that in order to bring down the head, Diplessy actually sent someone to buy her. Let her gossip everywhere: 'One night I dressed up and prepared to go out to my dear.' As a result, when I was passing by Swallow Road, I was targeted by one of my suitors. He told me that my Darling was having a hot fight with another woman. I didn't believe it, so he led me into a courtyard, and as soon as I entered, I heard the sound of the bed, and I leaned against the window to see that it was Vidocq and my darling who were violently assaulting an old washerwoman. ’”

When Arthur heard this, he almost squirted a mouthful of tea on the coconut tree's face.

The coconut tree said with a dark face, "Mr. Hastings, you also think this joke is nonsensical, don't you?" Fuck, those donkey day stuff, even this gossip has spread in order to force us to leave. Say we raped a washerwoman in her sixties, why didn't they say we raped a sow? ”

Arthur raised his handkerchief and wiped his mouth: "I think that if you had been holding on to it at that time, you might have raped the sow later." But the good thing is that Diplessy is out of the way now, and after Mr. Vidocq returns to the Ministry of Security, the situation should be better now, right? ”

The coconut tree smiled self-deprecatingly: "Better? Of course, when he first invited us back, he naturally offered us as saviors. But now, you see, why I'm in London now, isn't it worth pondering? ”

Of course Arthur knew what the coconut tree said, but he was just pretending to be confused.

As a result of his long-term correspondence with Vidocq, Arthur knew the dynamics of the Paris police community, if not the back of his hand.

Since the July Revolution, the Grand Paris Police Department, headquartered on Jerusalem Road in Paris, has been like a bus stop.

Beginning in 1830, in less than two years, the Grand Paris Police Department had seven successive directors.

Mr. Kashmir Perrier, the banker-turned-French justice minister, has not yet figured out who should be appointed to run the Paris police.

From a normal person's point of view, the appointment of a police head should naturally be chosen from among experienced police officers.

But it is a pity that as a representative of the big financial bourgeoisie, the appointment of officials in the July Dynasty followed a different set of logic.

They recommend businessmen with a steady style.

It is for this reason that, in September of this year, Monsieur Perrière formally appointed his old acquaintance, Mr. Henri Zysoquet, who had been apprenticed to his bank for seven years and had eventually founded his own bank, to take over the Grand Paris Police.

Compared to his predecessors, Mr. Zhisokai is clearly doing a much better job. But after Paris was hit by cholera, like Britain, the Parisian police, who had just gotten on their way, were soon stuck in the mud again.

London sent the military police and cavalry for cholera, and Paris was no better.

After cholera killed more than 300 people in a single day, there were a number of rioters attacking government offices in Paris.

The busy Parisian police were rumored to have taken advantage of the opportunity to inject cholera virus into Jewish drinking water.

At such moments, the political atmosphere in Paris has naturally become highly sensitive.

In London, cholera is mixed with parliamentary reform, and a major uprising is at risk at any time under double pressure.

In Paris, cholera threatens to penetrate the already weak rule of the July Dynasty and bury Louis Philippe's new dynasty in a coffin.

And at this moment, Vidocq, which is complex in composition, is naturally inevitably suspicious from above.

Born on the streets, Vidocq served in the Bourbon Legion in his early years and served in the Napoleonic government. In addition, he had many contacts with Hugo, Muse, Alexandre Dumas and other members of the Second Society of Paris.

Thus, in the eyes of the July Dynasty government, it was possible for him to be connected, whether it was a Bonapartist faction, an orthodox dynastic faction, or a republican.

(End of chapter)