Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/332

820 had been unwise enough to retain the services of Mr. F., a well-known and ill-known Bohemian of London—a man wielding a facile and elegant pen, a graduate of Oxford some decades before, and at present an ardent devotee of the sherry bottle.

Fully conscious that the "Chronicle" was the Emperor's paid organ—Mr. F. believing that so powerful a sovereign was made to fleece, and that the proper duty of mankind was to fleece him, made ducks and drakes of the money sent him from Paris by Peyton, who, on his part, was obliged to supplicate, plead, and almost threaten Mocquard each time it fell due. His incompetency no longer admitting of a doubt, Peyton found himself obliged to discharge the now irate Mr. F., who, as might have been expected, vowed instant vengeance on Peyton, the "Chronicle," and the Emperor, holding up the pet bug-a-boo—exposure of the French connection. But how was the exposure to be made? Alas! Mr. F. had ample evidence of the fact in the shape of letters scrawled by Peyton in Paris to Mr. F. in London, in which "our friend Nap." and "my partner Louey Napo.," was frequently alluded to when Peyton was in a jocular mood; and others written when more seriously inclined, in which the affairs of the subsidized organ were discussed with dangerous freedom. These letters Mr. F. placed in the hands of a solicitor, and, after much fruitless struggling, Peyton found himself mulcted in the sum of six hundred pounds sterling, which he paid over to obtain re-possession of these stupidly-written, criminating documents. Beside this, Mr. F. received indemnification for losing his situation, so that, upon the whole, he may be said to have fared well. He will, perhaps, laugh when he reads these lines, and congratulate himself on having had so vacillating a superior as Peyton in the matter of the "Morning Chronicle," for, with any other style of man to deal with, Mr. F. would surely have received condign punishment.

Of course, this matter had also to be kept a secret—not only from the Emperor, but even from Mocquard—for Peyton was sorely afraid to confess that he had committed what Mocquard would not fail to characterize as the grossest of indiscretions, and the troublesome part of all this secrecy was that the money had to be eked out of the subsidy in some way. To make it more awkward, an excuse was framed, and Mocquard importuned to advance the monthly allowance of twenty thousand francs, and, after much pestering on the part of Peyton, and many diables and sacré noms on the part of Mocquard, the latter promised to advance half of one month's subsidy. By the time he had made up his mind to this, Peyton had returned to London, and knowing this, Mocquard addressed himself to Mrs. Peyton. The letter is now before us as we write: