There is another
menace. I suppose you have heard that Mrs. Croix married a Frenchman
named Stephen Jumel while you were in Albany?"
"Yes!" exclaimed Hamilton, with interest; "who is he?"
"A Parisian diamond merchant and banker, a personal friend of Bonaparte.
The belief is that he came over here as a special emissary of the
Consulate. Of course he brought a letter to that other illustrious
agent, and to the amazement of everybody he married her. They must
handle thousands of French money between them. France would be
something more than glad to hear of your elimination from this
complicated American problem; particularly, if you demonstrate your
power by crushing this last hope of Burr's. I doubt if Burr would call
you out with no stronger motive than a desire for personal revenge. He
is no fool, and he knows that if he kills you, he had better put a
bullet through his own brain at once. He is a sanguine man, but not so
sanguine as not to know that if he compassed your death, he would be
hounded into exile. But he is in a more desperate way financially than
ever.
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