"But where are they to go to, sir?"
"That's no concern of mine."
Aurelle turned round furiously and left the room. Coming across Dr. O'Grady in the park, he asked his advice about the matter.
"Why, doctor, she had a perfect right to refuse to billet us, and from a military point of view we should certainly be better off at Nieppe. She was asked to
do us a favour, she grants it, and her kindness is taken as a reason for her expulsion! I can't 'evacuate her to the rear,' as Forbes would say; she'd die of it!"
"I should have thought," said the doctor, "that after three years you knew the British temperament better than this. Just go and tell the colonel, politely and firmly, that you refuse to carry out his orders. Then depict Madame de Vauclère's situation in your grandest and most tragic manner. Tell him her family has been living in the château for the last two thousand years, that one of her ancestors came over to England with William the Conqueror, and that her grandfather was a friend of Queen Victoria's. Then the colonel will apologize and place a whole wing at the disposal of your protégée."
Dr. O'Grady's prescription was carried out in detail by Aurelle with most satisfactory results.
"You are right," said the colonel, "Forbes is a damned idiot. The old lady can stay on, and if anybody annoys her, let her come to me."
"It's all these servants who are such a nuisance to her, sir," said Aurelle. "It's very painful for her to see her own house turned upside-down."
"Upside-down?" gasped the colonel. "Why, the house is far better kept than it was in her time. I have had the water in the cisterns analysed; I have had sweet-peas planted and the tennis lawn rolled. What can she complain of?"