Swords Reluctant by Max Pemberton

I

General d'Arny lived in an old house in the Boulevard St. Germain, one of the few monuments still existing to the golden age of Recamier and the salons. He did not care a scudo for the literary and artistic associations of this gloomy mansion, but much for the fact that he paid little rent. Beaumarchais had lived there on the eve of his flight to Holland; the great rooms had known Fleury and his fellows, Balzac and Saint-Beuve -- a very panel of genius written across the centuries.