I have several plans in my head, and I must know that I am fully trusted.

Above all, I must have power--decisive, absolute, illimitable power." There was nothing of the weakling about this small, sable-clad man, who looked the redoubtable Jacobin leader straight in the face and brought a firm fist resolutely down upon the table before him.

Robespierre paused a while ere he replied; he was eying the other man keenly, trying to read if behind that earnest, frowning brow there did not lurk some selfish, ulterior motive along with that demand for absolute power.
But Chauvelin did not flinch beneath that gaze which could make every cheek in France blanch with unnamed terror, and after that slight moment of hesitation Robespierre said quietly: "You shall have the complete power of a military dictator in every town or borough of France which you may visit.

The Revolutionary Government shall create you, before you start for England, Supreme Head of all the Sub-Committees of Public Safety.

This will mean that in the name of the safety of the Republic every order given by you, of whatsoever nature it might be, must be obeyed implicitly under pain of an arraignment for treason." Chauvelin sighed a quick, sharp sigh of intense satisfaction, which he did not even attempt to disguise before Robespierre.
"I shall want agents," he said, "or shall we say spies?
and, of course, money." "You shall have both.