“No,” Alain would reply, “you get married and have children. I’d rather make my own way in the world.” And Robert knew that his brother was telling the truth. It was the challenge and the adventure that Alain loved. Robert sometimes thought they were even more important to him than the end result.

Assuming that he lived and produced a family, then Robert’s dream was that he and Alain should have fine houses and estates near each other. And to this end, he was doing everything he could to secure his brother’s advancement in the world.

That was why, six months ago, he had left Alain in the country to run the estate for him, and come up to Paris to see what he could do for his brother. Taking a house in the fashionable Marais quarter, he’d set to work.

It had been agreed that Alain would come to Paris in September. Robert knew his brother was excited about the prospect. And now September had come. Alain had arrived. And Robert was faced with one awful dilemma.

Should he tell his brother how completely he had failed?

Or that the meeting they were going to this autumn day was his last big chance?

They were walking through the quarter known as the Marais, the marsh, that lay just north of the axis that ran from the Louvre to the Bastille. Whatever marsh remained was mostly drained now—although hints of the old mire could be smelled in the streets on many days—and during the last decades, some of the greatest men in France had built their mansions there.

Alain was plainly excited by the magnificence of some of these aristocratic “hôtels.” Mostly they consisted of a big courtyard behind a gateway—this was known as the cour d’honneur—a splendid mansion with wings, and a garden behind. As they stopped in front of the Hôtel Carnavalet, he cried out: “Just imagine, Robert, if our family could have a place like this!”

“Either you or I,” said Robert with a smile, “would have to be one of the richest men at court. So don’t get your hopes up just yet.”

Robert looked at his brother affectionately. He knew that Alain was already planning to live there, with the fortune that he did not have. He hoped so much that he might be able to help his adventurous younger brother toward his dreams.

In one respect at least, young Alain had a great advantage over the generality of men. He was an aristocrat.