“What are you thinking, Ned?” asked Nicky eagerly.
“I was wishing John had not gone back to London,” Carlyon replied unexpectedly. “Never mind! He will be here again the day after tomorrow!”
“John!” exclaimed Nicky. “Why, what use would he be, I should like to know?”
“He was telling me something which I cannot help feeling may have some bearing on this extraordinary event.”
Nicky’s face was alight. “Oh, Ned, do you think—Is it possible that—You know, I told Cousin Elinor this morning I thought very likely that fellow might be one of Boney’s agents, only then you said it was De Castres and J thought it had not been possible!”
“It is certainly unexpected. Yet I believe it would not be quite the first time a scion of one of these émigré families has thrown in his lot with Bonaparte.”
“How very shocking, to be sure!” said Miss Beccles, shaking her head. “It makes one feel so very particularly for their poor parents. But young persons are often very thoughtless, I fear.”
“It cannot be so!” Elinor said. “Why, I have in the past known several such families, and they would be disgusted by the very thought of such a thing!”
“No doubt the elder members of such families would be, ma’am, but there is no doubt that Bonaparte’s career and the regime he has set up have kindled an enthusiasm for his cause in some of the younger men’s breasts. It is no wonder, after all! They have little to hope for in England, and, one supposes, can find little to inspire them with hope in the Bourbon king and the set of men he keeps about him. But these are only surmises! We are running ahead a great deal too fast.”
Nicky, who had been sitting with knit brows, said, “It is very well, Ned, but how should Eustace have had anything to say to French spies? I never thought that he had even common sense!”