He swung the mantle round his great shoulders and then added instantly, fearful that he had seemed to boast, a thing his pride loathed: “Are you not really of my opinion, Rehnsköld? I have two great advantages—he cannot use his cavalry, and as the ground is enclosed his great numbers will be but an encumbrance. It is I who am really stronger than he, and have all the advantages.”
General Rehnsköld bowed his head in assent; there was not one of the staff officers behind him who did not consider the young King’s action rash to madness.
Karl saw this; for their opinion he cared nothing; but he greatly disliked to be suspected of bravado; his was not the unconscious modesty of a man who knows not he is great nor that his actions are remarkable, but the conscious austerity of one who is aware he is extraordinary and wishes to be acclaimed, but not by his own tongue.
“If I defeat the Czar here, Cracow and Varsovia are open to me,” he said, turning his blue eyes on the quiet faces of his officers.
Again General Rehnsköld bowed.
“I am entirely of your Majesty’s opinion.”
“At least you submit very gracefully, General,” replied Karl, with his ugly smile.
He turned away and Count Piper followed him.
“He will be as hard and obstinate as his father,” remarked an officer, shivering under his fur, for the cold was of Polar intensity.
“Eight thousand men against eighty thousand!” exclaimed another. “He thinks to rival Leonidas or one of his saga heroes.”