"
For his part he wanted to sell himself as dearly as possible. His great
anxiety as to the direction in which the wind was blowing, so that he
might invariably range himself on the side of that party, which, in
the hour of triumph, would be able to reward him munificently.
Unfortunately, he was groping in the dark. Shut up in his far away
province, without a guide, without any precise information, he felt
quite lost. While waiting for events to trace out a sure and certain
path, he preserved the enthusiastic republican attitude which he had
assumed from the very first day. Thanks to this demeanour, he remained
at the Sub-Prefecture; and his salary was even raised. Burning, however,
with the desire to play a prominent part, he persuaded a bookseller,
one of Vuillet's rivals, to establish a democratic journal, to which
he became one of the most energetic contributors. Under his impulse the
"Independant" waged merciless warfare against the reactionaries. But the
current gradually carried him further than he wished to go; he ended by
writing inflammatory articles, which made him shudder when he re-perused
them. It was remarked at Plassans that he directed a series of attacks
against all whom his father was in the habit of receiving of an evening
in his famous yellow drawing-room. The fact is that the wealth of
Roudier and Granoux exasperated Aristide to such a degree as to make him
forget all prudence. Urged on by his jealous, insatiate bitterness,
he had already made the middle classes his irreconcilable enemy,
when Eugene's arrival and demeanour at Plassans caused him great
consternation.
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