Two weeks later, the bubble didn't just burst. It exploded.
I stood on the balcony of the Chateau of Saint-Cloud, watching the horizon.
Black smoke coiled into the sky above Paris, five miles to the east. It wasn't the thin, gray haze of chimney fires. It was the thick, oily soot of burning buildings.
"Another bakery?" I asked.
Cléry stood beside me, holding a spyglass. "A warehouse, sir. In the Marais district. The mob thinks merchants are hoarding grain."
"They're not wrong," I muttered. "I am."
I turned away from the view. The air smelled of rain and distant panic.
My "Golden Parachute" strategy was working perfectly. The cellars of Saint-Cloud were packed with salted beef, flour, and wine. I was wealthier now, in real terms, than I had been as King.
But the silence in the hallways was deafening.
My son was gone. My wife was dead. I was a rich man in a graveyard.
"The courier arrived," Cléry said, handing me a sealed packet. "From the Ministry of War."
I took it. The paper was heavy, expensive. The seal was red wax, stamped with the new symbol of the Regency: a sword crossed over a fasces.
No crown. Just weapons.
I broke the seal.
It was a demand. Not a request.
Citizen Miller,
The State requires the immediate transfer of all surplus grain stored at Saint-Cloud for the provisioning of the Army of Italy. Compensation will be provided in Assignats at the official government rate.
Signed,
General Napoleon Bonaparte, Minister of War.
I laughed. It was a sharp, barking sound that made Cléry flinch.
"They want to buy my wheat with paper that's worth less than the ink they used to sign this," I said.
"What do we do, sir? If we refuse, they'll send soldiers."
"They won't," I said. "Soldiers need to eat too. If they march here, I'll bribe them with ham sandwiches and they'll desert."
But the letter triggered something in my chest. A flutter. A squeeze.
Arrhythmia.
I sat down heavily on the stone bench. My breath hitched.
I was dying. Slowly, surely. My heart was a ticking clock, counting down the minutes I had left.
And what was I leaving behind?
A burning country. A sociopathic son. A legacy of ash.
I couldn't just sit here and count my money while the world ended. The "Accountant" in me wouldn't allow it. It was bad management.
"Get me a pen," I said. "And paper. The good stock."
Cléry hurried to fetch my writing desk.
I didn't write to the Boy. He was lost to me. He was a machine running on a loop of conquest and cruelty.
I wrote to the only man who might listen. The man who held the leash.
To General Bonaparte,
I didn't use titles. I didn't use flowery language. I used bullet points.
1. The current rate of inflation is unsustainable. You are printing money to pay for a war that generates no revenue.
2. Price controls (The Maximum) create shortages. Farmers are burning their crops rather than selling at a loss.
3. Your army is fed, but your capital is starving. A starving capital riots. A rioting capital topples governments.
I dipped the pen in the inkwell.
Recommendation: Peg the currency to the looted gold from Lombardy. Lift price controls immediately. Import grain from America, paying in silver.
Warning: If you ignore this, the National Guard will mutiny within thirty days.
I hesitated at the bottom of the page.
How should I sign it?
Louis Capet? No. That man was dead.
Louis XVI? That man was retired.
I scrawled two letters.
A.M.
Alex Miller. The man who knew the math.
"Take this to the Tuileries," I ordered Bessières. He was standing guard by the door, looking healthier now that I was feeding him. "Give it only to Bonaparte. Not the Regent. Do you understand?"
Bessières nodded. "Yes, Citizen."
He took the letter and left.
I waited.
The hours dragged. The rain started, drumming against the glass of the French windows. I paced the library. I checked the ledgers. I reorganized the pantry.
I was anxious.
Why?
Because part of me—the stupid, sentimental part—still hoped. I hoped that Napoleon, the cold rationalist, would see the logic. I hoped that my son, the genius prodigy, would understand the equation.
I hoped they would let me help them fix the mess I helped create.
Night fell. The candles burned low.
At midnight, the sound of hooves echoed in the courtyard.
I rushed to the door.
Bessières stumbled in. He was soaked to the bone, mud splattered up his legs. He looked pale.
"Well?" I asked. "What did he say?"
Bessières didn't speak. He reached into his tunic and pulled out my letter.
It was crumpled. Wet.
And there was a hole in the center.
A knife hole.
someone had stabbed the paper against a wooden table.
"He... he didn't read it, Citizen."
My heart skipped a beat. "Who?"
"The Regent. The Boy King." Bessières swallowed. "He saw me deliver it to General Bonaparte. He took it from the General's hands."
I felt a cold chill. "And?"
"He stabbed it. With his dinner knife."
Bessières looked down at the floor, unable to meet my eyes.
"He said... he said, 'Tell the accountant that lions do not concern themselves with the opinions of sheep.'"
I stood frozen.
Lions and sheep.
He was quoting a fable. A child's story. But he wasn't a child. He was a monster who thought he was a god.
"And Napoleon?" I asked. "Did he say anything?"
Bessières flipped the letter over.
On the back, scrawled in heavy charcoal, was a note.
Go back to sleep, Alex. We are eating Italy. The army is fed. Paris can starve.
I stared at the words.
Paris can starve.
It wasn't malice. It was calculation. Napoleon had done the math too. He realized that as long as the soldiers were happy, the civilians didn't matter. He was building a military dictatorship on the bones of the Republic.
And my son was the figurehead.
I felt something snap inside me.
It wasn't my heart. It was my loyalty.
I had tried. I had tried to save the monarchy. I had tried to save the family. I had tried to save the country.
But the Board of Directors had rejected my consultation. They had locked me out of the building and set it on fire for the insurance money.
"Sir?" Cléry whispered. "Are you alright?"
I looked up. My hands were shaking, but my mind was crystal clear.
"No," I said. "I'm not alright. I'm unemployed."
I crumpled the letter and threw it into the fireplace. I watched the flames lick the edges, turning Napoleon's arrogance into ash.
"Pack a bag, Cléry. The small one. No crests. No royal seals."
"We're leaving?" Cléry looked terrified. "To Austria?"
"No," I said. "Austria fights with muskets. Muskets are obsolete."
I walked over to the large map of Europe hanging on the wall.
My finger traced the coastline of France. The blockades. The burning ports.
I looked North. Across the gray water of the Channel.
To the island that had been the enemy of France for a thousand years. The island of shopkeepers. The island of bankers.
"We need a partner who fights with balance sheets," I said.
I tapped my finger on London.
"But... that's treason," Bessières whispered. "High treason."
I looked at the soldier.
"Bessières, do you know what a Hostile Takeover is?"
"No, Citizen."
"It's when the current management is incompetent," I said, my voice cold as the rain outside. "So you go to their biggest competitor. You borrow their capital. And you buy the company out from under them."
I turned to Cléry.
"Send a signal to the coast. Find the smugglers. We're going to have a meeting with William Pitt."
I walked to the window and looked out at the burning city one last time.
"The Board of Directors has run this company into the ground," I whispered to the glass.
"It's time to liquidate."