Of course not.
Though André and Hoche had already declared their withdrawal from the Cordeliers Club, its president Danton had refused to approve it, insisting that both men had paid their annual membership in full. In truth, Danton—ever eager to secure influence within the Paris Commune—was actively seeking to ease tensions with André. There was no deep hostility between them; only, under the urging of Desmoulins and others, Danton had feared that André's growing prestige within the club might eclipse his own. Once André and Hoche resigned voluntarily, the roots of conflict evaporated, and cooperation between the two could, perhaps, be restored.
There was little doubt that when Marat called in the club for retaliation against André, the circle of lawyers, journalists, and intellectuals around Danton would refuse to support the Friend of the People. If anything, they might secretly gloat over Marat's misfortune. A small inducement from André could even turn them openly against him.
Men like Legendre, whose political sympathies leaned toward André, would oppose Marat all the more firmly. Although André had nominally left the club, Legendre had inherited and expanded his influence over more than twenty Parisian branches, even forming a public alliance with Thérèse Tallien and her faction. The result was deadlock: the debate dissolved without resolution, leaving the issue to wither away.
To attack in print the very "People's Lawyer" whom Marat had once publicly praised would have been absurd. Besides, neither Marat nor Hébert had any tangible proof against André—only rumours and conjectures, which would merely give the prosecutor fresh pretext for revenge. As for an attempt on André's life, neither man dared risk it.
"So," Marat said wearily, "we compromise. No more provocation, no more probing into his affairs." He sighed, then tried to console the despondent Hébert. "We haven't lost everything. That poor devil Piero's bravery cost André five men. Trust me—I know him. The matter ends here. He won't pursue it further."
When the dejected Hébert finally left, Marat's mistress Simonne entered from the adjoining room. She was an unremarkable woman of plain looks and gentle manner, utterly devoted to Marat, without the shrill coarseness many imagined of revolutionaries' wives.
"Is it really over?" she asked softly, applying ointment to the inflamed patches on his skin. As a founding member of the Cordeliers Club, she had seen firsthand André's brilliance during the Babeuf trial, how effortlessly he turned defeat into triumph, manipulation into art.
Marat smiled faintly and shook his head. "The prosecutor's fury won't cool so easily. I'll write him a letter. Have Legendre deliver it. André is a political animal by nature—he'll understand my offer of reconciliation. Otherwise, he wouldn't have chosen so minor a target for his first strike."
He paused, his expression darkening. Inwardly, he felt a surge of disgust for Hébert. A leader who cannot endure is no leader at all. In contrast, his follower Pierre Chaumette from the Lombard district was far more promising—like Marat, he had studied medicine and once worked as a pharmacist.
Marat's instinct proved correct. That very evening, when André received his letter, he exhaled deeply, the stone in his chest at last sinking away. He immediately ordered Javert to halt any further retaliatory measures.
Marat had underestimated his own importance in the mind of the traveler. Unless driven to extremes, André would never willingly make an enemy of the Friend of the People. As long as their common foes endured, there would always remain ground for collaboration between them.
On July 19, the day before André was to depart for the Gironde, he rode down to the river quays along the Seine to see off the United Steam Company's delegation bound for England. The industrial mission numbered twelve: among them were Jean-Baptiste Say, Casimir Périer (the elder brother), Fourier, and a host of engineers, metallurgists, architects, and accountants.
Over the preceding month, Say—the company's general director—had journeyed up the Seine and Marne rivers with Chief Engineer Périer, scouting potential factory sites. They had finally chosen the city of Châlons-sur-Marne as the company's headquarters.
Beyond André's financial backing, Say had favoured the location for its lower construction costs, access to coal and iron from Alsace-Lorraine, and relative security. After a generous relocation subsidy, most of the technical staff agreed to move with their families to the new provincial capital.
At twenty-four, Jean-Baptiste Say was broad-shouldered, square-jawed, his nose prominent, his dress unadorned. He could hardly imagine that history would one day remember him as one of the founders of modern economics—the first systematic exponent of classical liberal thought on the European continent, and the world's earliest professor of industrial economics.
In another timeline, Say would later cofound a textile factory near Paris, whose success would make him both prosperous and renowned. To André, Say represented not merely an engineer but a polymath—a mechanic, an architect, a future scholar, and a born industrialist.
The traveler had long admired him. After several personal visits, Say had agreed to André's offer to become general manager of the United Steam Company. In return, André, as majority shareholder, pledged not to interfere directly in management decisions—though matters of technology would remain under Chief Engineer Périer's authority.
Before boarding, Say studied the list André handed him: a dozen names, most unfamiliar—among them Richard Trevithick, Robert Fulton, and Edward Jenner.
André pointed to the paper. "This task should have been the engineer's, but you know Périer—brilliant, yet painfully inarticulate. So I'm entrusting it to you. Bring these men to France if possible; terms and pay are negotiable. But Trevithick, Fulton, and Jenner must be secured at all costs. Trevithick is a young engineer at a tin mine in Cornwall; Fulton, an American draftsman studying steam power at Watt's factory. As for Jenner—he's no engineer, merely a country physician in Berkeley, Gloucestershire. Tell him I'm deeply interested in his cowpox inoculation experiments against smallpox, and that I'll personally fund his research in France for the sake of mankind."
He placed a sealed letter in Say's hand. "Deliver this to Dr. Jenner yourself."
Say frowned slightly—not from objection to the task, but from concern. Funds were already thin. Of the 200,000 livres André had advanced, little remained after construction, machinery, and resettlement expenses. He hesitated.
André, reading his mind, smiled. "There's another hundred thousand with the accountant. And through Mr. Ouvrard's connections at the London Exchange, the Bank of England has agreed to back a six-month bill of exchange for £30,000—about 600,000 livres—to finance British purchases."
Five days after leaving Paris, André and his mounted detachment reached the town of Châlus in the southwest corner of Haute-Vienne, near the border of the Dordogne. The Isle River lay barely sixteen kilometers away. If all went well, they would embark by dawn and reach Bordeaux within forty-eight hours, ending their long, punishing ride.
Punishing especially for André. His men, born of peasant and herdsman stock, were natural horsemen, hardened to rain and dust. But the prosecutor himself, unaccustomed to such endurance, had spent five consecutive days in the saddle, his back aching, thighs raw and blistered.
More than once he considered hiring a carriage to spare himself, yet pride forbade it. A commander who faltered before his troops was no commander at all—just as he had always despised the weakness of Louis XVI.
He turned to glance behind him: the troopers were weary but in good spirits. They had marched and eaten together, endured alike. When word spread that they would lodge in a proper inn that night instead of the damp field tents, cheers rose through the ranks.
"Augereau!" André called, lifting his whip toward the town ahead.
The Prussian sergeant looked up from his horse, still performing flamboyant tricks for the amusement of the men.
"Clear the way!" André ordered, pointing toward a grey-painted inn some eight hundred meters from the city's edge.
It was a modest establishment, worn and unadorned. Evening had fallen, and from within came the din of laughter, clinking cups, and raucous song—the mingled voices of travelers, merchants, and painted women who plied their trade along the town's edge.
The prosecutor straightened in his saddle. After the miles of silence and dust, the noise of the living city returned like a pulse—wild, vulgar, but unmistakably human.