He turned away and took a brief leave.
“An extraordinary man,” he said to himself, as he left the King’s presence, “but there is no true greatness in him.”
Karl, on his part, was equally disgusted with Count Piper.
“I want no politicians about my camp,” he told his brother-in-law that evening. “We are soldiers with soldiers’ work to do,” and he began to discuss his plans for an advance on Cracovia and Varsovia.
BOOK IV
AURORA VON KÖNIGSMARCK
“Sylve paludes, aggeres, hostes, victi.”—Medal of Karl XII.
CHAPTER I
“I THINK you have no idea of the confusion of my affairs—nor of their apparent hopelessness. I speak of them to you because you are the only person whom I can trust.”
Thus Augustus to Aurora, and in these words she read his confession of utter defeat; she was deeply vexed; for some time past she had displayed ill-humor at the growing discomforts and perils of her situation; she was now at Varsovia, a barbaric place that she disliked, where Augustus had come to attend the Polish Diet that he had been forced to convoke. It was midwinter, and she sat over the fire in the huge stone chamber that was so difficult to warm, her great coat of lemon-colored velvet lined with white fur, thrown open on her lace gown, and the leaping glow of the firelight all over her bright beauty.
She knew that perhaps her principal hold on Augustus was her good temper, and seldom was she betrayed into anger; but now her disappointment made her answer sharp.