That summer, Napoleon passed his graduation exams and graduated from the École Militaire as he had hoped. He was transferred to Régiment de la Fère and attained the rank of second lieutenant of artillery. Joseph went to the stagecoach station the day Napoleon left Paris to see him off. Napoleon was dressed in a new gray-blue uniform, with a sword at his waist, looking extraordinarily spry and, if he hadn't been shorter, a bit formidable.
"A little bit of an officer." Joseph reached out and patted Napoleon on the shoulder and said, "Do well and become a general sooner rather than later."
"What's so great about being a general in France?" Napoleon butted in.
"Don't say things like that in front of other people." Joseph said, "Do a good job in the army and practice real skills that will be useful in whatever you do in the future."
After seeing Napoleon off and returning to the school, Joseph had just sat down at his desk and hadn't even had a chance to make himself a cup of coffee when he saw Will, the principal's secretary, walk in.
"Mr. Bonaparte, the principal wants to see you about something." Will said.
Joseph hurriedly rose to his feet and followed Will toward the small two-story building that the principal had all to himself.
"Will, what did the principal want with me?" Joseph asked as he walked along the path towards the small building by the garden beds.
"It's also like there's some kind of engineering thing going on up there, I'm not exactly sure, you'll find out when you meet the principal later." Will replied.
The two men entered Count Du Pont's little building as they spoke, and a wigged attendant drew open the door for them and again took the hat Joseph handed him in his hand and said: "Mr. Bonaparte, the Count is waiting for you in his office upstairs. Please come with me."
Joseph followed the attendant up to the second floor and into Count Du Pont's office. The attendant then retreated.
"Ah, Monsieur Bonaparte, there you are." Count Du Pont said.
"Principal, can I help you with something?" Joseph asked.
"Yes, some engineering stuff. Well ... have you ever been to Calais, the one that specializes in lace?" Count Du Pont asked suddenly.
"No." Joseph replied.
"Oh, Calais is not bad for a city in the provinces. It's great to take a little lover or lovers on vacation. But this time I mentioned Calais to you not for that, but because of a military mission. Would you like to go?" Count Du Pont smiled.
"I am willing to serve my country." Joseph hurriedly said, "I wonder what it's about?"
"Nothing, the batteries in Calais Harbor are too old to be used. So a new battery for defending the harbor was needed. And a math consultant was needed to build this new battery. This matter should have been arranged for Mr. Monge. It's just that Mr. Monge had other matters to attend to, so he recommended you. Joseph-is it all right for me to call you that?"
"Of course there's no problem." Joseph hurriedly said.
"Well, Joseph." Count Du Pont said, "The school salary is actually very limited, it's good enough to not starve, but it's not easy to make a good living on it alone. And performing these kinds of tasks is very tiring, but the income is very good. A couple times out on a mission like this, you can save up a small fortune. Look at Monge, he's actually paid more than you on a limited basis, but by having more of these kinds of things, he's making at least six or seven times as much as you are."
Joseph knew that Monge had recommended this matter to him, certainly because he was too busy with his own affairs, but the intention to look after himself was also obvious. Then he gratefully said, "Thanks, Principal."
"Thank me for what? You should thank Mr. Monge more than anything." Count Du Pont laughed, "Of course, Monge is a bit of a quaint man, and if you were to give him a gift, he might even think you were insulting his character ..." At this, Count Du Pont shook his head again, "If you want to thank him, you'd better send him a thoughtful essay that has something to offer. Well, you're going as a math advisor this time, and both I, and Monge, hope that you'll take this opportunity to advance further in your academic endeavors. Well, things aren't too urgent over there, but if you don't have anything else to do, organize the work at hand and report to Calais as soon as you can."
Knowing that this statement was basically the Chinese equivalent of ending a meal with tea, Joseph thanked Count Du Pont once again and retreated. Now that the semester was almost over, he had basically nothing on his hands. So, after a little treatment, three days later, with a letter of introduction issued by Count Du Pont, he boarded a stagecoach and traveled to Calais.
In later times, with the Eurostar high-speed rail link between Paris and Calais, it doesn't even take an hour to get from Paris to Calais. But in this era, there were no such good things, and Joseph took two full days to arrive in Calais near sunset.
Since it was already late, Joseph did not go directly to the naval camp at the port of Calais. At this time of year, he would more than likely not be received by anyone on the Navy side. So he found a very ordinary inn directly near the harbor and stayed there, and after fighting the bedbugs all night, he left the inn at first light the next day and resolved never to live in such a cheap inn again.
Along the streets paved with stone strips, Joseph walked in the direction of the harbor.
The harbor of Calais is divided into two parts, one side being the noisy civilian docks, where a number of flute-type ships and a few others are docked along a couple of trestles. It's still early, but there are sailors already visible scrubbing the decks. And on the other side, the French Navy's military dock. The military dock at Calais Harbor was much smaller than the civilian dock, with only a single trestle bridge, and by the trestle bridge, only a single-deck frigate and a patrol boat with only two masts were moored. The main body of the French Navy had always been in the direction of the Mediterranean. The port of Calais was too close to England - standing high up on the shore looking west if the weather was good, one could even look directly across to the white cliffs that stretched on either side of the harbor of Dover. Calais is only thirty kilometers or so in a straight line from the British military port of Dover, and the French Navy may feel that if they place their main forces here, there is always a concern that one day, they will be blocked directly by the British Navy in the harbor. That's why they never set up their main force here. Perhaps on the same basis, the British never deployed their main fleet at Dover either.
Joseph then walked in the direction of the military dock. He walked up to the gate with its rejecting horse erected.
"Halt! Military restricted area, no entry!" A red-nosed sentry shouted toward him, then came toward Joseph with a flintlock rifle with a bayonet.
"I am Joseph Bonaparte, a math teacher at the École Militaire in Paris. I've been ordered to come and report to Commander Villefort." Joseph said as he pulled out a letter of introduction and handed it over.
The sentry turned his gun over to his left hand, took the letter of introduction to his right, scanned the cover, looked up at Joseph, and said: "Sir, please wait here for a moment."
With those words, he turned around with the letter of introduction and walked inside the gate. With a few words of command to another sentry, he took the letter and headed toward a small building over there.
Joseph then stood outside the gate and waited. After a while, he saw the sentry approaching with a captain.
The captain said to Joseph, "Mr. Bonaparte, I am Navy Captain Cissé. Commander Villefort is not in the harbor right now. Instead, it's in the fortress on that hill over there. I can send one of my men to drive you there."
"Then I'll be counting on you." Joseph replied.
"Do you know how to ride a horse?" Captain Cissé asked again.
"A little." Joseph replied.
"That's good." Cissé said. He turned to the sentry again and said, "Pierre, go get us two horses."
The sentry complied and left, and Cissé then talked to Joseph.
"Is there actually such a young math teacher at the Paris École Militaire these days?" Cissé said.
"Mr. Monge was also young when he came into prominence." Joseph replied.
"Ah, yeah, geniuses do that." Cissé said, "Well, I see by your name that your ancestors are Italian?"
"I'm a Corsican." Joseph replied, "It's kind of half Italian."
"My grandfather's generation was still Italian. However, our family has been in France for three generations. Well, I don't even speak Italian very well anymore." Cissé said, "I've heard that the Corsican dialect is very close to Italian?"
"Very close indeed, even in the sense that the Corsican dialect should be counted more as a dialect of Italian ..."
The two men were talking when Pierre, the sentry, had come with two horses.
These were two ordinary military horses; the Navy only needed horses for commuting and pulling, not warhorses for charging into battle.
Cissé said as he handed Joseph the reins of one of the gray and white flowered mares: "Mr. Bonaparte, you follow me while I slow down."
With a word of thanks, Joseph took the reins and rolled onto his horse. Cissé stood to one side, seemingly ready to help Joseph if necessary. When he saw that Joseph had simply mounted his horse, he nodded and rolled onto the other horse as well, then spurred it on and walked ahead.
The fortress wasn't really that far from the military harbor; in fact, the fortress was right next to the harbor on top of a small plateau a few dozen meters high. The two men drove their horses at a trot for a few minutes before approaching the fortress.
Dismounting in front of a fortress keeper's horse, Cissé said a few words to the sentry in front of the fortress, handed the two horses over to that sentry, and then led Joseph into the fortress.
'The sentry recognized Cissé for sure. But just because he recognized him, he did not even ask questions, and then allowed him to bring another person into the fortress, this discipline of the French Navy is enforced ... no wonder it will be hanged by the British tricks.' Joseph couldn't help but think.
Cissé led Joseph down a gravel road, around the gun emplacements on the front, then around a grove of maple trees, and a small, white, two-story building appeared in front of them.
"This is the command post of the fort, and Commander Villefort is here." Cissé said to Joseph. Then led Joseph over.