“Papa, meanwhile, was ejaculating all sorts of things. ‘Sit down, sit down, in God’s name! Amelia, some wine! Louis, my dear boy, what happened to you?’
“‘I was left for dead at Savenay, and picked up next day by some peasants,’ says the Vicomte simply, and much as he might have said, I had a tooth out yesterday. And then he hastened to present the Chevalier d’Aubeville, a quiet and somewhat sad-looking man whose appearance pleased me. After that we got Louis into a chair, and I fetched some wine—not that it had much effect upon his appearance. He has a horrible air of delicacy. He looks as frail as a girl.
“It seems that at Savenay he was run through the body, and lay all the rest of the day and the whole night long on the battlefield—imagine, Philip, in December!—was found by some charitable peasants and nursed by them for six weeks. Then, as he was supposed to be dying, they made efforts to get a priest, and the priest, when he was procured, turned out to be M. des Graves, of whom you have often heard us talking, escaping from the prisons of Nantes. M. des Graves stayed with him for a long time (nearly two months, I believe), and undoubtedly, Louis says, saved his life. Then he brought him over to England, and gave him over into the care of M. d’Aubeville (an old friend of Louis’ whom they picked up at Jersey), and has himself gone to Rome to be a Cardinal.
“I did not hear some of this till afterwards, for, as you may imagine, I was concerned about the Marquise and Lucienne. If George had been at home I could have sent him down to the copse to break the news. On the whole, I thought that the risk of shock to the Marquise would be greater than to a girl, so I left the two in the library with papa and went upstairs.
“I really think, Philip, that I am more sorry for my aunt than for any of the others. Gilbert is dead, and to my mind he died gloriously. Lucienne, although, poor girl, she has suffered unspeakably, will have what we know now to have been her heart’s desire, and, with her, Louis will learn, one hopes, to forget all that he has been through.
“But the Marquise idolised her son. The only comfort is that she has truly gained a daughter in Lucienne, for since last Christmas there has been no trace of the little rubs which sometimes used to arise between them, and I am sure that she will sincerely rejoice in Lucienne’s happiness. As for Louis, it is long since I have heard her make those disparaging remarks about him which I used at the time to doubt if she really meant.
“I don’t know how I told her, but I contrived to do it somehow, putting my arms round her, and beseeching her to be calm. She turned very white, and I saw her look for a moment at the miniature of Gilbert as a boy, which stands on her escritoire, and I guessed what she was feeling.
“I ran down ahead of her to the library. Papa was coming out.
“‘I have put him next door in the dining-room, my dear,’ he said; ‘take your aunt in there.’ Then he saw the Marquise, who had just reached the foot of the stairs, and going up to her he said rather huskily, ‘Providence has sent you back another son, Felicity,’ and retired very quickly to the library, where I heard him blowing his nose again.
“My aunt went in to Louis, but of course I do not know what they said to each other in there. . . .”