We stayed the night at Versailles, and next morning when we returned to Paris, it was to take up our old quarters at the Luxembourg. It was not exactly a pleasant home coming. Count Saxe had looked for another sort. But he was the last man in the world to repine at fate.
CHAPTER XV
THE LOST SHEEP
On the first of January, 1728, my master again took up his abode in his old quarters at the palace of the Luxembourg.
And how did he employ himself? Chiefly with amusettes, as far as I know. This answer I have made many thousands of times. I always have to explain what amusettes are. They are not young ladies of the ballet, or anything of the sort, but very complete military toys, with which many scientific experiments may be made. Count Saxe was the first man to do this, and he had whole cabinets full of small brass cannon, and toy arms of every description, with which he made useful and serious improvements. And these toys were his amusettes. But was that all he did? For I have been asked that also many times. Well, he studied much—more out of books than was commonly thought; and he went often to the theater, and only occasionally to court, albeit the king doted on him so far as Louis XV could dote on any man. Philippe de Comines has said that there is but one thing more severe on a man than the favor of kings, and that is their enmity. This is a great truth, and my master acknowledged 188 it when I read it out of the book of Philippe de Comines.
The king would not let Count Saxe out of France except with extreme reluctance, and for short periods; but kept him, for five mortal years, standing, as Count Saxe said, like an equestrian statue, with one foot always uplifted to march, but never marching. Now, if any one wishes to know what else Count Saxe was doing during those five long years, let him ask some one who knew him better and was more in his company than Babache, his captain of the body-guard of Uhlans. I swear I knew nothing on earth of anything concerning Count Saxe, except what is put down in this book. I know that the women ran after him enough to drive him to drink, had he been so inclined. How much attention Count Saxe paid them in return I have not the slightest notion, and I never was the man to pretend to know what I did not know.
In January of 1728 Gaston Cheverny joined us. We had scarcely established ourselves in our old quarters at the Luxembourg, when one evening, while the snow lay deep on the streets of Paris, the door to my room, next Count Saxe’s, burst open, and Gaston Cheverny, gay and bold, dashed in.
I was rejoiced to see him again, and only grumbled that he had not arrived before to aid me in many troublesome matters, like that of providing an equipage for Count Saxe at a night’s notice; but he took my rating with laughter. The evening was cold, and a fire blazed upon the hearth, before which Gaston stretched his legs and pulled off his boots, replacing them with fine shoes of Spanish leather. We had only been separated 189 four weeks, but we had many questions to ask of each other. Gaston, as a soldier, was eager to know of Count Saxe’s plans. I told him of the project to buy the regiment of Spar, which was shortly after carried through, and of the king’s evident determination to keep Count Saxe in his service.