"What! Alone and without an army!" Malcolm exclaimed in astonishment.
"I suppose he despairs of getting assistance from Louis. Now that Fontenoy has put an end to danger on the frontier the King of France is no longer interested in raising trouble for George at home."
"But it is a mad scheme of the prince's," Malcolm said gravely. "If his father did not succeed in '15 how can he expect to succeed now?"
"The country has had all the longer time to get sick of the Hanoverians, and the gallantry of the enterprise will appeal to the people. Besides, Malcolm, I am not so sure that he will not do better coming alone than if he brought the fifteen thousand men he had at Dunkirk last year with him. Fifteen thousand men would not win him a kingdom, and many who would join him if he came alone would not do so if he came backed by an army of foreigners. It was the French, you will remember, who ruined his grandfather's cause in Ireland. Their arrogance and interference disgusted the Irish, and their troops never did any fighting to speak of. For myself, I would a thousand times rather follow Prince Charles fighting with an army of Scotsmen for the crown of Scotland than fight for him with a French army against Englishmen."
"Well, perhaps you are right, Ronald; it went against the grain at Fontenoy; for after all, as you said, we are closely akin in blood and language to the English, and although Scotland and France have always been allies it is very little good France has ever done us. She has always been glad enough to get our kings to make war on England whenever she wanted a diversion made, but she has never put herself out of the way to return the favour. It has been a one sided alliance all along. Scotland has for centuries been sending some of her best blood to fight as soldiers in France, but with a few exceptions no Frenchman has ever drawn his sword for Scotland.
"No, I am inclined to think you are right, Ronald, and especially after what we saw at Fontenoy I have no wish ever to draw sword again against the English, and am willing to be the best friends in the world with them if they will but let us Scots have our own king and go away peacefully. I don't want to force Prince Charles upon them if they will but let us have him for ourselves. If they won't, you know, it is they who are responsible for the quarrel, not us."
"That is one way of putting it, certainly," Ronald laughed. "I am afraid after having been one kingdom since King James went to London, they won't let us go our own way without making an effort to keep us; but here is a crossroad, we will strike off here and make for the west."
They avoided the towns on their routes, for although they felt certain that they were ahead of any messengers who might be sent out with orders for their arrest, they knew that they might be detained for some little time at Nantes, and were therefore anxious to leave no clue of their passage in that direction. On the evening of the third day after starting they approached their destination.
On the first morning after leaving Versailles they had halted in wood a short distance from Chartres, and Malcolm had ridden in alone and had purchased a suit of citizen's clothes for Ronald, as the latter's uniform as an officer of the Scotch Dragoons would at once have attracted notice. Henceforward, whenever they stopped, Malcolm had taken an opportunity to mention to the stable boy that he was accompanying his master, the son of an advocate of Paris, on a visit to some relatives in La Vendee. This story he repeated at the inn where they put up at Nantes.
The next morning Malcolm went round to all the inns in the town, but could hear nothing of the Duke of Athole, so he returned at noon with the news of his want of success.