"Oh," said Judith, with a little show of playfulness, "you need not think that I shall be behind you in sangfroid: you have put me quite on my mettle!"
Goodnights were exchanged; both ladies retired again to their rooms, each with a much better opinion of the other than she had had at the beginning of what, in retrospect, seemed to have been the longest day of her life.
Chapter Nineteen
The night was disturbed. Many of the Bruxellois seemed to be afraid to go to bed, and spent the hours sitting in their houses with ears on the prick, ready to run out into the streets at the smallest alarm. Just before dawn a melancholy cortege entered the town, bearing the Duke of Brunswick's body. Numbers of spectators saw it pass through the streets. The sable uniforms of the Black Brunswickers, the grim skull-and-crossbones device upon their caps and the grief in their faces, awed the thin crowds into silence. A feeling of dismay was created; when the sad procession had passed, people dispersed slowly, some to wander about in an aimless fashion till daylight, others returning to their houses to lie down fully clothed upon their beds or to drop uneasily asleep in chairs.
Between five and six in the morning, after an interval of quiet, commotion broke out again. A troop of Belgian cavalry, entering by the Namur Gate, galloped through the town in the wildest disorder, overturning market-carts, thundering over the cobbles, their smart green uniforms white with dust and their horses roaming. They had all the appearance of men hotly pursued, and scarcely drew rein in their race through the town to the Ninove Gate. All was panic; they were shouting: "Les Franqais sont ici!" and the words were immediately taken up by the terrified crowds who saw them pass. The French were said to be only a few miles outside the town, the Allied Army in full retreat before them. Distracted Belgians ran to collect their more precious belongings, and then wandered about carrying the oddest collection of goods, not knowing where to go, or what to do. Women became hysterical , filles de chambre rushing into hotel bedrooms to rouse sleepy visitors with the news that the French were at the gates; mothers clasping their children in their arms and screaming at their husbands to transport them instantly to safety. The drivers of the carts and the wagons drawn up in the Place Royale caught the infection; no sooner had the cavalry flashed through the great square than they set off down every street, rocking and lurching over the pave in their gallop for the Ninove Gate. In a few minutes the Place was deserted except for the people who still drifted about, spreading the dreadful news, or begging complete strangers for the hire of a pair of horses; and for a few market-carts driven into the town by stolid peasants in sabots and red night-caps, who seemed scarcely to understand what all the pandemonium was about.
Many of the English visitors behaved little better. Some of those who, on the night of the 15th, had stoutly declared their intention of remaining Brussels, now ordered their carriages, or, if they possessed none, hurried about the town trying to engage horses to procure passages on the canal track-boats. For the most part, however, the flight of a troop of Belgic cavalry did not rouse much feeling of alarm in British breasts. Ladies busied themselves, as they had done the previous day, with preparations for the wounded, and if there were some who thought the cessation of all gun-fire ominous, there were others who considered it to be a sure sign that all must be well.
Judith and Barbara again went to the Comtesse de Ribaucourt's. On entering the house Judith encountered Georgiana Lennox, who came up to her with a white face and trembling lips, trying to speak calmly on some matter of a consignment of blankets. She was scarcely able to control her voice, and broke off to say: "Forgive me, this is foolish! Only it is so dreadful - I don't seem able to stop crying."
Judith took her hand, saying with a good deal of concern: "Oh, my poor child! Your brothers -?"
"Oh no, no!" Georgiana replied quickly. "But Hay has been killed!" She made an effort to control herself. "He was almost like one of my brothers. It is stupid - I know he would not care for that, but I can't get it out of my head how cross I was with him for being so glad to be going into action." She tried to smile. "I scolded him. I wouldn't dance with him any more, and then I never saw him again. He went away so excited, and now he's been killed, and I didn't even say goodbye to him."
Judith could only press her hand. Georgiana said rather tightly: "I can't believe he's dead, you know. He said: 'Georgy! We're going to war! Was there ever anything so splendid?' And I was cross."