Chapter 52: Scene of Hell (Requesting Monthly Votes)

Victor Bonaparte nearly jumped off the sofa, pointing a finger at Lionel, completely unable to form a coherent sentence.

His meticulously prepared recruitment had been utterly crushed by the other's onion-like dissection and scathing yet profanity-free irony.

He felt like a clown stripped of his fine garments and exposed to the biting cold wind. He abruptly turned to Henri Patin, his voice pitched high: "Dean Patin! Is this what the Sorbonne turns out? An arrogant, ungrateful, and rabble-rousing agitator who wantonly insults the Empire and the Bonaparte family?! You must—"

"Victor!" Dean Henri Patin, who had been sitting in silence feigning sleep, suddenly spoke. His voice was not loud, but it carried an undeniable authority.

He slowly stood up, his "portly belly" no longer looking clumsy, but rather serving as a symbol of "steadfastness" and dignity.

He walked between the two young men, first casting a complex yet approving look at Lionel, and then turning to Victor Bonaparte.

"Victor," Dean Henri Patin's tone turned serious and distant, devoid of its previous polite formalities, "Mr. Lionel Sorel is a fully registered student of the Sorbonne Faculty of Arts. He enjoys all the rights bestowed by the institution, including the freedom of thought and speech. His words just now, though sharp, did not violate any school rules or laws. He was merely expounding his understanding of the essence of literature and his views on the ownership of his work. This is the professional integrity expected of a scholar and a student!"

He paused, looking at Victor's face, which was further distorted by shock and anger, and continued: "As for the 'friendship of the Bonaparte family' you offered on behalf of your esteemed father, the University of Sorbonne, as an academic institution, has no right to interfere in a student's personal choices. Lionel has clearly expressed his intentions. I believe today's meeting can end here."

"Dean Patin! You...!" Victor could hardly believe his ears! This hitherto smooth and deferential dean, so accommodating to the powerful, was actually siding with this commoner student: "Do you know what you are saying? My father is a senator! The Bonaparte family..."

Even Lionel was somewhat surprised.

"The Bonaparte family has left a profound mark on the history of France, which no one can deny." Dean Henri Patin calmly interrupted him, his gaze sharp. "Yet the history of the Sorbonne is older than any family, any dynasty. Our duty is to safeguard knowledge, truth, and the spirit of independence. Victor, your words and actions today, if I may be so bold, are filled with an arrogance and coercion utterly incompatible with the spirit of the Sorbonne. This disappoints me greatly."

These words struck Victor Bonaparte's heart like a final, heavy hammer. Not only had he been thoroughly humiliated by Lionel, but even Dean Patin, upon whom he thought he could rely, had openly turned against him!

Panic instantly overwhelmed anger. He suddenly realized that it had been ten years since France last had an emperor, and now this land belonged to the Republic.

Although Dean Henri Patin was not a political figure, he was the weighty Dean of the Sorbonne Faculty of Arts, a member of the Académie française, and a universally renowned scholar—if he were to leak out the fact that Victor had tried to coerce and bribe a Sorbonne student today...

Cold sweat instantly soaked Victor's back, and his meticulously groomed black hair seemed to lose its luster. He looked around; Dean Henri Patin's gaze was burning like a torch, while Lionel's gaze had returned to calm, not even looking at him anymore, but instead leafing through the *Moniteur* on the table.

"Fine... very well..." Victor Bonaparte's voice was dry and hoarse, entirely stripped of the arrogant tone typical of the aristocracy.

He grabbed his cane, forgetting to put on the gloves he had taken off upon entering, and staggered back two steps. "Dean Patin... Lionel Sorel... you... very well... farewell!"

He even forgot to maintain basic parting etiquette, spun around, and practically fled, his cane striking the floor in a chaotic and hurried rhythm.

He pulled open the heavy oak doors of the dean's office, his wretched figure disappearing into the hallway. Moments later, the heavy sound of a luxury carriage crushing the cobblestones of the Sorbonne courtyard drifted up.

The office fell silent once more, save for the ticking of the wall clock. Llingering in the air were the undissipated scent of cigars and a faint trace of high-end cologne belonging to Victor.

Dean Henri Patin let out a long breath, as if unloading a burden of a thousand pounds. He walked to the door, gently closed it, then turned around, looking at Lionel with a complex gaze, and revealed a faint smile: "Aren't you afraid? His father is the current head of the Bonaparte family."

Lionel smiled back: "Mr. Dean, do you really think France will once again welcome an emperor surnamed Napoleon?"

Henri Patin thought for a moment: "Though Prince Louis is still in England, many already call him 'Napoleon the Fourth'... Oh, and the young 'Napoleon' who was just here also seems quite ambitious; his place in the line of succession is second only to Prince Louis."

Lionel stood up, walked to the window, and watched the carriage adorned with the imperial emblem gradually recede into the distance.

Only then did he turn back to ask Henri Patin: "If one day—and I say if—this young 'Napoleon' truly becomes emperor and decides to settle today's old scores, will the Sorbonne still stand behind me?"

Henri Patin took a puff from his pipe, slowly exhaling a cloud of blue smoke: "That will be a long time from now, and by then I shall probably be a pile of rotting bones. However, Lionel, do not overestimate the Sorbonne..."

Hearing this "stunningly" honest warning, Lionel bowed to Dean Henri Patin: "At least today, the floors of the Sorbonne are clean. Thank you for defending me and the dignity of the Sorbonne today. If there is nothing else, I shall take my leave."

Henri Patin did not speak, only nodding wearily.

————————

"This is the Eleventh Arrondissement? This is Oberkampf Street? This is where Lionel lives?"

Maupassant stepped out of the carriage, looking in disbelief at the unfamiliar sights before him.

Half an hour ago, he had been smoking a cigar in Mr. Flaubert's study in the Saint-Germain district, a room permeated with the fragrance of books and the serene ambiance of oriental carpets. Now, he was standing face-to-face with the raw reality of a Parisian working-class neighborhood.

A thick, complex, and almost tangible stench of reality struck him like a dirty fist. It was the horrific aroma of rotting vegetable leaves, inferior grease, untreated excrement, cheap alcohol vomit, cheap perfume, and sweat fermenting, mixing, and evaporating in the chilly early spring air of Paris.

The path beneath his feet could hardly be called a street; it was a trap paved with mud and garbage. The stone slabs were long shattered, and the puddles pooled with black-green sewage, reflecting a turbid, greasy light.

The buildings on both sides of the street seemed bent by age and poverty. The drab walls were covered in stains and rain streaks, their windows mostly obscured by thick layers of grime, many with shattered panes crudely mended with rags or cardboard.

The crowd was boisterous, coarse, possessing an almost primitive vitality intertwined with despair.

Men in faded blue work clothes and weary eyes gathered in groups of threes and fives, either leaning against tavern doors or squatting at street corners, loudly conversing and cursing in slang and profanity, their spit flying into the turbid air.

Most of the women were sallow-faced, wrapped in worn aprons or shawls. Some scrubbed clothes vigorously by the doorway troughs, while others clutched baskets, bargaining fiercely and shrilly with hawkers beside the filthy stalls.

Children ran barefoot or in tattered shoes, chasing and playing amidst the mud and refuse, their faces and hands caked with dirt.

Maupassant could almost feel the gazes lurking in the shadows—thieves weighing the contents of his pockets, beggars eyeing his potential handouts, prostitutes assessing his purse and inclination.

And there were the numb gazes of the residents, filled with hostility or sheer curiosity, stinging like needles against him as an out-of-place intruder.

"Lionel wrote *The Old Guard* in this kind of environment? No wonder... this place is practically hell!" Maupassant muttered inwardly.

Every ruthless detail of that short story, every scar on the old guard's body, every sarcastic jeer in the tavern, every numb observation through the young clerk's perspective... at this moment, acquired an incomparably concrete, incomparably heavy reality in his mind!

Maupassant felt a wave of dizziness, his stomach churning, making him want to immediately turn and flee this nauseating street.

Yet a voice quickly caught his attention: "Mister, want a go? Only 10 sous!"