The Marquis de La Mole is the Parisian nobleman, father of Mathilde and Norbert, who hires Julien Sorel as secretary on the recommendation of Abbé Pirard, and who in the end gives him a new name and a lieutenant's commission before refusing the marriage with his daughter.
His youth marked him: after two years of fortune and honors at court, 1790 threw him into the miseries of exile. He receives Julien with generosity, has him arrange "twenty-two more shirts," and is disappointed in him over a spelling mistake. During a gout attack he makes Julien his companion and gives him a blue suit. At night, dressed this way, Julien is treated as the younger brother of the Count de Chaulnes; in the morning, in black, he goes back to being a secretary.
He is also a political man. He takes Julien to a secret meeting in which he himself proposes forming a force "of five hundred men per department," and he charges Julien with recording what each person says and carrying by heart the secret message that comes out of it. He also has a long lawsuit against the vicar general Frilair, and it was while following that case with Abbé Pirard, Frilair's adversary, that he came to appreciate the priest's wit.
When Mathilde becomes pregnant, his "mad passion" to see his daughter with a fine title collides with reality. He shouts that his daughter will not be a duchess, then gives away lands and invents for Julien the name Chevalier de La Vernaye. Madame de Rênal's letter does the rest: he swears he will never consent to the marriage and leaves without saying where he is going. Every place he gives Julien comes through a change of clothes or a change of name, never as Sorel.