Adolphus glanced at the banners which were being displayed in the still air, all of them glittering with gold and silk which traced, he knew, patriotic and bold inscriptions; then he watched with interest his own banner being brought up the hill by a galloping horseman.
Louis was straining his eyes down the darkling road where Aremberg was almost due.
"He will wait for Meghem, who cannot be a day's march behind," he said anxiously; "when he sees how we are entrenched he will skirmish and wait."
"God be entreated," said Adolphus, "that he attacks us."
They mounted, and were scarcely in the saddle before news came from the outposts that Aremberg was in sight.
The banner of Adolphus now waved at the head of his little troop of horsemen (not more than three hundred) who waited on the hill to take up their position.
Adolphus still looked at this banner; the morning breeze caught the folds and blew them out, showing the arms of Nassau with the mark of cadency of the fourth son and the words, "Je Maintiendrai," together with the inscription which was the motto of Louis' army, "Nunc aut nunquam, recuperare aut mori."
The brothers now, by a common instinct, turned to each other and clasped hands.
The two fine young faces, so alike in feature and expression in the stern frame of the open casque, gazed at each other with a wistful and silent affection.
Their hands loosened and they moved away, when suddenly Adolphus turned back, and, dropping the reins, threw his right arm round Louis' neck with a womanly gesture and kissed him; then at a gallop he swept away, put himself at the head of his little troop, and led them down the hill to their desperate and perilous position.