Flowers, Swords and France

After putting on a careful make-up, Charles went to the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré again at the appointed time, walked into the small restaurant he had been to before, and met with Du-Taye, an old acquaintance, the banker. The previous excitement had long passed, and he had regained his original calm state of mind. After all, this was just a small step on the road, and it was not worth taking it too seriously.

Charles did not care at all about the fact that he had a quarrel with his cousin at the Duke of Treville's house, and did not take it to heart at all. Instead, he continued to implement the established plan. Because the breakdown of the relationship with them was expected.

After exchanging the secret code again as last time, the waiter of the restaurant took Charles to the small room on the second floor.

"Oh! My friend, you are finally here!" As soon as they met at the door, Du-Taai opened his arms exaggeratedly and grabbed Charles' hands, "I guess you have been working hard recently!"

"Not bad." Charles was much more reserved, he pulled his hands away calmly, "Not very busy."

"Congratulations!" Du-Taai laughed happily, "I guess you must have put a lot of effort into bringing down Mr. Soult?"

Compared to the last time they met, the banker is in a much better mental state and his attitude is much more enthusiastic.

Obviously, this is because he was inspired by the incident of "Prime Minister Soult being forced out of office", and he has more confidence in the ultimate success of the organization's cause.

"It only played a small role, not worth taking too seriously." Charles half said the truth modestly, half pretended to be mysterious in front of his colleagues, "Okay, let's talk about business now..."

"Well, okay, let's talk about business first." Du-Tae pointed to the table full of dishes, "Come, please sit down, let's talk while eating..."

Charles was not polite, and sat directly at one end of the table, and then ate roast goose while pouring himself some wine.

After the two of them had dinner for a while, it seemed that Charles' silence had consumed some of his patience, and Du-Tae finally asked softly.

"So what do you want to talk to me about this time?"

"Nothing important," Charles tried to make his tone seem very calm, "Now everyone's plan has been fully rolled out, and many places need money, so I want to get some more sponsorship from you."

When he heard that he wanted money, Du-Tae's original smile was restrained a lot-of course, this is also human nature.

"This...maybe...I'm a little nervous here recently..." His answer was a little hesitant.

Since he invested so much in and sponsored the Bonapartists, he must sincerely hope that the organization can win the final victory - but this does not mean that he will abandon everything to support them without hesitation. A banker is always stingy when spending money, and it takes patient persuasion to make him pay more than he originally wanted to pay.

So Charles was not surprised by his reaction.

No matter what doctrine a political group believes in, the most lacking thing is funds. And this is also the most troublesome problem. Whether it is by deception or by robbery, a group that can solve the financial difficulties is at least invincible. It doesn’t matter if the actions fail again and again, as long as the gold vein continues.

Just like in the era of the Great Revolution, Britain organized seven anti-French alliances in order to suppress France, and used money to drive and arm several powerful countries. Although Napoleon was able to defeat the united enemies several times, as long as he could not destroy Britain, the anti-French alliance would never be considered a loser - the final result also proved this point. Britain had the last laugh. Although it spent hundreds of millions of pounds and the government owed astronomical debts, it at least had the last laugh.

And the Bonaparte family just doesn't have much money now.

Although in the later Second Empire era, Louis-Bonaparte used his power to make tens of millions of dollars and was extremely rich, and left behind the famous legend of "eating with aluminum bowls instead of gold bowls", the current Bonaparte family can be said to be quite embarrassed. Needless to say, Napoleon's own branch has died out, and none of his brothers who once relied on Napoleon's light to become famous are doing well.

Former King Joseph of Spain died in 1844, and this branch has little money;

Former King Louis of the Netherlands (the father of Louis Bonaparte, the current head of the Bonaparte family) died in 1846, and this branch also has little money.

Former King Jerome of Westphalia (the father of the future Prince Joseph Bonaparte) is still alive, but his early years of bohemian life have already squandered all his savings, so of course he has no money now.

Former Prince Lucien of Canino and Musignano died in 1840, and this branch has some money, but it’s a pity that Lucien had a very bad relationship with the emperor when he was alive, causing a rift between the brothers. And his branch also continued this style, and had a very bad relationship with the Bonaparte family and its supporters. Otherwise, Lucien’s son Charles-Lucien-Bonaparte is the oldest of all the emperor’s living nephews, and the position of the head of the Bonaparte family may have been passed to him. In short, it is almost impossible to get sponsorship from him...

In summary, the Bonaparte family itself cannot provide much help when Charles and other supporters carry out activities. Basically, they can only make empty promises such as "we will give you xxxx after the success". It is also thanks to everyone's loyalty and diligence that they can create so much momentum by raising sponsorship on their own.

Perhaps for this reason, after Napoleon III came to power, he was very kind to the heroes who supported him to power. Not only was he willing to provide various benefits on weekdays, but he also rarely disobeyed their wishes and requests, and even occasionally offended them. He could also laugh it off - maybe it was through the years of mutual help and support that they developed a relationship?

Ciel sighed softly.

"Mr. Du Taai." His tone became much more serious.

The banker nodded slightly to indicate that he was listening.

"Needless to say, you must be able to understand that now is a critical moment. If we want to win the final victory, we must make various preparations in advance. Recruiting manpower, purchasing weapons and buying key figures do not require money. ? Even keeping secrets? It's very expensive. Do you think we will ask you for money for no reason?" Charles increased his voice, "We are not beggars, but people who are ready to bring you huge wealth. You have forgotten this. Don’t you want all your previous investments to be wasted?”

Du Taai was still silent, but his face was obviously a little shaken.

"Of course, spending money to go out, and spending a lot of money to go out, would be heartbreaking for anyone else. We will never fail to understand your mood at the moment. On the contrary, because we understand it very well, we will appreciate and admire you even more." Xia I breathed a sigh of relief, "I can guarantee you that as long as it succeeds, within a year or two, the money you spent will be able to make up for it again. Earn it back, and the rest will be pure profits... You are a banker, and I certainly don’t know as much about money as you do, since you usually give out large sums of money that others have deposited with you. Those merchants then wait to collect interest. Isn't it the same for us? The interest is much higher than you think..."

Under his earnest temptation, the banker finally nodded.

"Okay, how many do you need this time?"

Ciel secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

"Three hundred thousand francs."

The banker's eyes widened, obviously unable to accept this amount. "This is too much! My funds are a little tight now and I can't afford so much at once."

Charles frowned, seeming a little dissatisfied with his answer.

However, he was a lion who opened his mouth from the beginning, so he didn't actually care about his rejection at all.

Perhaps it was his expression that made Du Taai a little nervous, and the banker hesitated again. "Look, how about I give you one hundred thousand francs first?"

Read the original article in Liu#9@书/吧!

In fact, it was close to Ciel's psychological price this time, but Ciel still frowned.

"Maybe not enough..."

The banker lowered his head, thought for a moment, and finally gritted his teeth.

"Let's do this. I'll chip in here and give you 200,000 the day after tomorrow. This is the limit I can use recently. If it's more, I'm afraid I won't be able to cope with the daily turnover."

"Great!" Charles clapped softly, "On behalf of Mr. Louis Bonaparte, I would like to express my most sincere thanks for your enthusiasm and generosity!"

Du Taai sighed softly, his eyes a little complicated.

"I really hope you can succeed soon!"

"It's not you, it's us." Ciel corrected him, "You are one of us, and an important one. We will never forget this."

"That's good." Du Taai took another sip of wine, as if he wanted to make up for the two hundred thousand francs from this glass of wine, "This is the best."

Ciel smiled and nodded.

Then the two people quickly discussed the method and place for handing over the new sponsorship money, as well as the secret code at that time.

"Let's have another drink." After the conversation was settled, Charles raised his glass.

The banker followed suit and the two toasted again.

"By the way, my friend. Why are funds so tight recently?" Charles asked casually after drinking.

"There was a problem with a few payments. I should have received them at the beginning of the month, but I haven't received them back yet." Du Taai said somewhat gloomily, "In addition, in order to stabilize the interest rate, I recently bought a lot of city hall bonds. …”

"The current situation is really not good. Every industry is not doing well. Since funds are so tight, don't invest indiscriminately. Be careful that something unexpected happens and everything is lost." Charles opened with a hint of malice. It was a joke, but the other party definitely didn't understand the meaning. "Even the city hall is afraid of fire."

"I'm not afraid of that. Even if the court changes, the government will still have to acknowledge its dues..." Du Taai obviously couldn't understand Charles's cold joke that transcended the times, "And I have the credentials here. Even if something goes wrong over there, you can still reconcile..."

[French King Francois I established a public bond in 1522 due to financial constraints. Because dividends were fixed at the Paris City Hall every quarter, it was named "City Hall Bond". It was the largest debt in French financial history. An ancient political annuity, it is also an epoch-making milestone in French financial history.

At that time, the Paris City Hall was burned down together with the Tuileries Palace by uprising fighters during the Paris Commune uprising in 1871. Countless archives and documents were reduced to ashes along with the building. So this is a cold joke that is "ahead of its time". 】

"Well, then it's up to you."

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