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The servants appeared, the horses were taken, and Cary and his guest entered the quiet old house. A little later, in the drawing-room, over a blazing fire and a bottle of wine, Mr. Hunter laid aside a somewhat quaint air of injured dignity, and condescended to speak of Fontenoy and of how very changed it was since the old days. "Nothing like so bright, sir, nothing like so bright!
I do not know when or why the Seven Years' War, the Thirty Years' War, the Hundred Years' War or the Massacre of St. Bartholomew took place, why the Edict of Nantes was revoked or what it was, or who fought at Malplaquet, Tours, Soissons, Marengo, Plassey, Oudenarde, Fontenoy or Borodino or when they occurred. I probably did know most if not all of these things, but I have entirely forgotten them.
For this and this alone one French army, wasted by sword and famine, had perished in Bohemia; and another had purchased with flood of the noblest blood, the barren glory of Fontenoy. And this prince, for whom France had suffered so much, was he a grateful, was he even an honest ally? Had he not been as false to the Court of Versailles as to the Court of Vienna?
"I'm much astonished the horses didn't bolt!" said the man addressed. "That bay mare would have lost all the temper she's got in another moment. It's a good thing we made them shut the carriage it has turned abominably cold. Hadn't you better sit down?" And Lord Fontenoy made a movement as though to withdraw from the hand on his shoulder.
"I have lived long enough, sir," he said, "now that I have seen your Majesty victorious. You now know on what the fortune of battles depends." The victory of Fontenoy, like that of Denain, restored the courage and changed the situation of France.
The Duke of Cumberland had lost the military reputation acquired at Fontenoy; the King of Prussia remained alone on the Continent, exposed to all the efforts of the allies; every day fresh reverses came down upon him; the Russian army had invaded the Prussian provinces and beaten Marshal Schwald near Memel; twenty-five thousand Swedes had just landed in Pomerania.
Williams gave the order to Cunningham, and not long after they stopped before the d'Orient in the Rue Daunou, and Fontenoy flashed in with Mrs. and Master Williams's cards, and came out after an interval and stationed himself stiffly near the step of the victoria. This meant that Mrs. Burton was at home, as we say, or, "at herself," as the French have it.
Letty meanwhile, conscious that she was not showing to advantage, flushed, began to play nervously with her fan, and wished that George would leave off. Fontenoy did nothing to assist George's political lesson. He stood impassive, till suddenly he tried to look across his immediate neighbours, and then said, turning to Letty: "The Maxwells, I see, are here to-night."
He is held one of the best officers among the red-coats, a special friend and favourite of the Elector himself, and of that dreadful hero, the Duke of Cumberland, who has been summoned from his triumphs at Fontenoy to come over and devour us poor Highlanders alive. Has he been telling you how the bells of St. James's ring? Not "turn again, Whittington," like those of Bow, in the days of yore?
She Madeleine was his friend, his good angel. Would she go to his mother and break it to her? Would she understand, and forgive him? There must be no opposition, or he would shoot himself. And so on, till the poor girl, worn out with excitement and grief, tottered into Mrs. Allison's room more dead than alive. But at that point Fontenoy stopped abruptly.
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