Solovyov in Tsarist Russia 1796.

Chapter 216 An Injustice in Paris

After leaving Nancy, the group continued to head towards Paris. Prince Dolgorukov and his family were still very concerned about this city. When the prince himself sent his two sons to Strasbourg, he came to Paris on the way. At this time, he had to stay for a while again.

They also had a house to rent, and they lived in a country villa that Mr. Lebrun had taken back. The environment there was also very good, and they had several children to raise together.

It just so happened that Ekaterina also wanted to learn basic painting techniques from her sister Julie, and here she had to say goodbye to Solovyov.

"Brother Mishka, I will write to you."

"It's not far from Paris to the country, and where are you going?"

"Papa says it's Montargis, where Madame Lebrun has been staying lately."

Montarzh Solovyov felt that he could shut up now. Montarzh was not too far away and he could go there if he had time.

Now we have to go to the embassy and meet Count Morkov.

Then he found out that his rank had been promoted. Anyway, it was not obvious from the uniform he was wearing. Clothes of that era were more about beauty. After all, there was no way to distinguish them by the epaulettes.

"Lieutenant Colonel, you can live on the second floor. We still have plenty of space here."

"Thank you, Arkady Ivanovitch, but I want to rent an apartment outside, and I won't take any confidential documents with me, and I don't have any such documents."

"Then you should also hire servants here. It would be best if you could find a companion from China to live with you, so that you can have someone to look after you."

However, it is not easy to hire a follower outside the 2nd arrondissement of Paris.

Fortunately, when Solovyov changed his clothes, he no longer looked like a Russian, and his accent was difficult to discern when he spoke.

But if such a young and respectable man hired a servant or a maid, he would not be able to get things done nearby after leaving the Russian Embassy at Hôtel de Lévis.

Solovyov was also a very cautious person. As soon as he left the embassy, ​​he found someone following him at the door.

However, the Paris Police Department has limited manpower, and its main focus should be on the ambassador himself and his long-term entourage.

Although Count Morkov and Mr. Talleyrand had a very pleasant conversation and reached a peace agreement between the two sides in 1801, the First Consul did not like the ambassador very much. The two sides had different opinions and sometimes there were some minor frictions, but these were still trivial matters for the First Consul.

Now Napoleon has no intention of driving Morkov away, and the two sides are in a state of peace, so any diplomatic stance he takes still needs to be cautious.

Solovyov turned around and quickly went to the Italian Theater Street, a theater built in 1783.

It was just a coincidence that when he turned here, he happened to catch the end of an Italian drama. Many people came out of here, and some shields could be seen, and they seemed to be some Italians.

Considering that the current First Consul also serves as the President of the "Italian Republic", it is not surprising that his supporters in Italy appear here.

Among them was Prince Borghese, who came from Rome. Solovyov recognized their family coat of arms, which was mentioned in Sylvia's letter.

I don't know what happened to Sylvia. Although Solovyov paid a lot of attention to girls, he had to devote more attention to other things. Although he had some money with his status, it was not enough, and he also needed a career. After all, he was still very young.

If Sylvia were here, he would perhaps have met her. She must have become a pretty lady now, and from her letter last year he knew that she was still unmarried.

Of course, Solovyov didn't know much about it. Silvia was working as a housekeeper for Prince Borghese's family, and the two brothers in this family often came to Paris. They were fanatical supporters of General Bonaparte, but they rarely brought the women in their family with them.

After these people dispersed, Solovyov walked forward, but he saw a little girl curled up next to the crowd and a float next to them.

"Little girl, what's wrong with you?"

"Sir, do you want to buy some flowers? Come and have a look. Flowers from the flower market can be used to decorate your bedroom. Put one in your bedroom."

Although the child is unkempt, his eyes are very bright.

Poor girl, Solovyov thought so, but he also noticed that the child was barefoot in the hot summer, and got herself dirty, and one of her feet seemed a little red and swollen.

Solovyov also has an old problem, which is that he is soft-hearted.

During battles, he was always fierce, but he was also quite gentle and kind to others.

"Little girl, how do you sell your flowers?"

"Only 10 centimes, sir, and they're all yours." The little girl was still smart enough and picked up a large bouquet of flowers from the float next to her.

Solovyov sometimes puts flowers at home, but he has not yet decided where he will live. The embassy is the official residence of Tsar Paul and the current Queen Mother Maria when they stayed in Paris. If he wants to find a place to live, the two streets leading out of the embassy, ​​Rue de la Theatre Italia and Rue Gramont, do not seem appropriate.

"Sir, these are too many. If you give 20 centimes, you can buy more flowers, but it is not appropriate to buy so many."

"No, little girl, I'm going to give you 20 centimes. I want to ask you, where is the cheapest apartment around here?"

“In the 2nd arrondissement, there are places on rue Montmartre where you can rent cheap apartments that are clean.”

"Well, I need to be clean. This is my first time in Paris. You can tell from what I'm wearing that I'm a respectable person."

But Solovyov still felt a little pity for the child when he looked at her. She must have sprained her ankle, but she still had to sell flowers here.

"What if I want you to be a maid and clean my room? One franc for two days, how about that?"

"Sir, you gave me too much, and I have to sell flowers here."

"What's your name?"

"Adela, sir."

"Who's in the family?"

This girl named Adela, who sells flowers here, does have an aunt, but she doesn't seem to be very kind to her. Her mother died of disease, and her father was guillotined. She has an extra set of tableware, but the living conditions of children on the streets of Paris are not very good. She is still healthy, except for some malnutrition and a sprained foot.

I don't know what Solovyov was thinking, he actually waited here for a while. After all, it was almost time to close the stall, and the child lived at the corner of an alley on Montmartre Street.

"If you are like this, how are you going to pull this float back? And you sprained your foot."

Solovyov was not without a solution. He turned around and did not go far away. Instead, he took a big job for the girl.

The ambassador's wife also came to Paris and lived in the embassy. Solovyov wanted to please the count and countess, so he paid for the car full of flowers.

Anyway, after he arrived in Paris, he exchanged some francs for "Ange" silver coins, which were all in his wallet.

"This money is more than enough to even buy your float."

"Sir, why are you doing this?"

"Can you tell I'm a foreigner?"

"Sir, from your manner, you are indeed a foreigner. But what is more impressive is your green eyes. In Paris, people will spend a lot of money on flowers, but they will not buy so many at one time."

"I want you to be my maid, cleaning the room, looking after the apartment, and helping me with things from time to time, such as delivering letters or doing other things. Although it may be a bit hard for a 12-year-old girl."

Solovyov thought that when he rented an apartment, the landlady should help with cleaning, but he hired a child as a maid so that she would not be suspected when doing some things.

Moreover, he was not very familiar with the situation in Paris. If the landlord did not have good judgment, this child looked smart and could actually be a helper in getting things done.

"Sir, you are a very good person, but I think..."

It doesn't matter. I'll take you back home and explain this to your aunt. Then we can take advantage of this time to rent a house. You should also change your clothes and wash yourself. As a servant of a foreign baron, you should wear clean clothes.

Speaking of which, he sometimes does things in a very abstract way. If it is not abstract, it is not Russian.

Adela sprained her ankle and had difficulty walking, limping along the road, but she refused Solovyov's help. She was a little girl with quite a bit of personality.

As for her aunt, things seemed very simple. Adela's aunt didn't want to keep her any longer, and she had some extra money left after buying flowers today, as if she had signed a contract to sell herself.

"Well, Adela, you are a little maid now. Let's go to 205 rue Montmartre first. Why there?"

"Sir, there was an unjust case there, so the rent is very cheap. I heard this from my cousin who was in the army."

"Your cousin is nice to you?"

"But he went to Italy and never came back. I don't know where he went."

After hearing this, Solovyov did not continue speaking. It is very likely that he was killed by the Austrian or Russian army in Italy.

As for this unjust case, it has a lot to do with the robbery of a money transport truck from Paris to Lyon in 1796 during the Directory period.

It’s just that the people who hijacked the money transport truck were real robbers, not Georgian bankers.

In the end, the Paris Police Department arrested the wrong person based on the description. After sending Joseph Le Saugues and several others to the guillotine in accordance with the resolution of the Council of Five Hundred, it was not until 1800 that they discovered that they had arrested the wrong person and chopped off the wrong head, and that the criminal was someone else.

Adela's cousin probably knew that the citizen of Le Suques was wrongly accused, so he told his little cousin.

Moreover, the ending of this family was quite tragic. The wife went mad and died, the son joined the French army as a drummer, and in order to clear his father's grievances, only one daughter still lived there.

It was in the apartment at No. 205, rue Montmartre that Solovyov met the landlord, who mentioned this girl.

"Sir, the rent here is very cheap, and it looks very clean. There is a little girl cleaning here. I didn't expect you to hire a girl as a servant. Of course, the rent will be easier this way."

"I'm from abroad, Baron Max Otto von Stirlitz, from Augsburg. How much do you need to pay first?" The fake identity from Augsburg came with a fake certificate that the Austrians had helped to make to fool people.

"It's an honor for us to have a respectable person like you living here."

"I thought we had to address people as citizens when we talk here."

"Not everyone can be called citizen. Now you can also call him Mr., Baron Stirlitz. The most turbulent times are over. Everyone should enjoy life."

"Including that poor girl?"

"Yes, this child was originally the daughter of a merchant, but now her family is broken up and all her property has been confiscated. It is clearly a false accusation, but the Minister of Justice is very diligent. If you want to clean up this dirty little girl, you will need her help. Jeanne, come and help clean up the little servant that the Baron brought with him."

"thank you, sir."

"It's the right thing to do, and I know this child. Adela's aunt treats her badly. If a kind gentleman could hire her as a maid, it would be better than letting her sell flowers there all the time. You know, if she's dressed like this, even if she's selling flowers, she often can't sell them at the door of the theater. It's only because Adela met you."

It seems that the landlord is not a bad person. Solovyov is also worried that in Paris, where people are arrogant and look down on others, and others look down on colonial residents, some arrogant and inappropriate guys will appear.

As for Jeanne, she was named after her deceased mother. She looked to be about thirteen or fourteen years old. She was dressed neatly and her face looked gentle, but she looked listless.

What a poor girl, the landlord was right, she took Adela to take a bath and change her clothes.

It was here that the king was replaced by the Public Safety Committee, the Directory, and then the First Consul, and in the future he will be replaced by the Emperor. For some citizens, life did not change at all, and even a wealthy merchant family was quickly broken up.

This was the result of the suspicions that the judge in charge of the case at the time, Mr. Dobandon, had always had and the result of his subsequent investigation. However, the judge only brought the real criminal to justice, but was never able to redress the injustice.

In order to truly overturn this case, all it would take is for the Minister of Justice and the head of state to step in and overturn the original resolution of the Council of Five Hundred, but this is often ignored in France.

PS: This case was not finally overturned until 1868 during the reign of Napoleon III.

(End of this chapter)