The hard task was only lightened when, as time advanced, public
trouble began to mingle itself with private grief. Then absorbing
political necessities came as a relief to domestic misery. Then
it grew to be the one purpose and pursuit of Danville's life
cunningly to shape his course so that he might move safely onward
with the advancing revolutionary tide--he cared not whither, as
long as he kept his possessions safe and his life out of danger.
His mother, inflexibly true to her Old-World convictions through
all peril, might entreat and upbraid, might talk of honor, and
courage, and sincerity--he heeded her not, or heeded only to
laugh. As he had taken the false way with his wife, so he was now
bent on taking it with the world.
The years passed on; destroying changes swept hurricane-like over
the old governing system of France; and still Danville shifted
successfully with the shifting times. The first days of the
Terror approached; in public and in private--in high places and
in low--each man now suspected his brother. Crafty as Danville
was, even he fell under suspicion at last, at headquarters in
Paris, principally on his mother's account. This was his first
political failure; and, in a moment of thoughtless rage and
disappointment, he wreaked the irritation caused by it on
Lomaque. Suspected himself, he in turn suspected the
land-steward.
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