The Duchy of Alsace-Lorraine, temporary capital, Metz.
Thiers pushed aside the documents in front of him and stretched.
The former senior official of Alsace-Lorraine Province had unquestionably been a petty bureaucrat concerned only with lining his own pockets. The province's administration was a complete mess, and its accounts were even murkier.
Louis Philippe had handed him a total disaster. The mountain of government work was impossible to get through, and many matters were tangled and directionless.
Yet now Thiers was brimming with energy, just as he had been in his youth. Perhaps this was what it felt like to build something from scratch.
After more than three months of hard work, Alsace-Lorraine Province had finally gotten back on track.
The food and economic crises in the province had both been resolved, thanks, astonishingly, to smuggling trade with the German Confederation.
Aside from Alsace-Lorraine's coal and iron, cotton, lumber, and marble were all hot-selling goods in the German regions.
The region's many rivers also made transportation convenient. Everything was moving in the right direction.
Just then, a senior administrator hurried in, looking furious. Mr. Mitra was an exceptionally capable man.
Thiers trusted and admired him, and was grooming him as his successor. As his senior, he felt it was only right to offer him some guidance.
But before Thiers could open his mouth, Mr. Mitra said, his face ashen, "The French Second Republic's army is here!"
The easy smile vanished from Thiers's face, replaced by shock and fury.
"How far have they gotten?"
"They've already passed Nancy."
"What? That means they're less than fifty kilometers away!"
There was anger in Thiers's voice. He hated both the invading French army and the soldiers who had put up such a halfhearted resistance.
Back when the question of Egypt had come up, Thiers had