It had been my whole life, thinking of him and the Empire, while I brushed the Prince's clothes or combed his hair.

Why should such tastes be given to a valet?
Some one somewhere was to blame, dear Cure.
I really did not conceive or plan imposture.

I was only playing a comedian's part in front of the Louis Quinze, till I heard Parpon sing a verse of 'Vive Napoleon!' Then it all rushed on me, captured me--and the rest you know." The Cure could not trust himself to speak yet.
"I had not thought to go so far when I began.

It was mostly a whim.

But the idea gradually possessed me, and at last it seemed to me that I was a real Napoleon.