"Unless Mazarin suffers from a lapse of memory," I remarked. "So far his payments have been made mostly in promises, which do little towards keeping a full purse."
At this M. Belloc laughed, but he assured me that when the day of reckoning came I should have no cause to complain.
CHAPTER XXV.
I Miss a Grand Opportunity.
For several weeks now I stayed idly at Bruhl, having nothing to do beyond an occasional turn of duty, which was really more a matter of form than of aught else.
Underneath the peaceful surface there were, to shrewd observers, signs of a stirring agitation. Couriers came and went by night and day; noblemen of high rank made mysterious visits, stayed a few hours, and then disappeared; a rumour arose that the Cardinal had actually been recalled to Court. It was even said that the order was contained in the letter I had carried from Paris, but on that point I was still in ignorance. By degrees, however, it became plain that the Cardinal had resolved to return and I learned from Belloc that Marshal Hocquincourt was busy raising an army to conduct him across France.
No one was more pleased to receive this news than Pillot, who could not live happily without excitement. He uttered no complaint, but I knew he was longing to be back in his loved Paris, from which he had never before been so long absent. To Pillot the walls of the capital bounded the one oasis in a desert world.
One evening, early in December, Belloc ordered me to be ready for a start the next morning. The die was cast; Mazarin had made up his mind, and I was to form one of the advance-guard in the journey to Sedan.
"Bravo!" cried Pillot, joyfully; "it is time we moved, monsieur. I am beginning to forget what Paris is like."