“Then you have a part to play, too,” said Desiree, thinking of Charles, who had been called away at such an inopportune moment, and had gone without complaint. “It is the penalty we pay for living in one of the less dull periods of history. He touches your life too.”
“He touches every one's life, mademoiselle. That is what makes him so great a man. Yes. I have a little part to play. I am like one of the unseen supernumeraries who has to see that a door is open to allow the great actors to make an effective entree. I am lent to Russia for the war that is coming. It is a little part. I have to keep open one small portion of the line of communication between England and St. Petersburg, so that news may pass to and fro.”
He glanced towards Mathilde as he spoke. She was listening with an odd eagerness which he noted, as he noted everything, methodically and surely. He remembered it afterwards.
“That will not be easy, with Denmark friendly to France,” said Sebastian, “and every Prussian port closed to you.”
“But Sweden will help. She is not friendly to France.”
Sebastian laughed, and made a gesture with his white and elegant hand, of contempt and ridicule.
“And, bon Dieu! what a friendship it is,” he exclaimed, “that is based on the fear of being taken for an enemy.”
“It is a friendship that waits its time, monsieur,” said D'Arragon taking up his hat.
“Then you have a ship, monsieur, here in the Baltic?” asked Mathilde with more haste than was characteristic of her usual utterance.
“A very small one, mademoiselle,” he answered. “So small that I could turn her round here in the Frauengasse.”