It was dusk in the spring afternoon before the terrace and the old palace came in sight. Roger rode straight for the palace. As he clattered up to the old gateway, he saw a cavalcade before him. Poor King James, old and feeble, still rode gallantly to hounds three times a week, scorning the calash in which his brother of France would have driven him. He had just returned from one of his hunting parties. Berwick was with him. The Queen and the little Prince of Wales and the little Princess, “La Consolatrice,” were awaiting the King at the gateway. Roger Egremont, riding up, dismounted, and falling on his knee in the muddy street, kissed the hands of his unfortunate master, and then paid his respects to the Queen and her two fair children.
Berwick, who had dismounted to hold the King’s stirrup, turned to Roger and embraced him.
“I had your letter just nine days ago,” said Roger in Berwick’s ear.
“Then you know nothing of what has happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Mr. Egremont,” said the King, “I wish to see you alone for a few moments,” and walked ahead. Roger Egremont followed him up the well-known stair, along those familiar saloons,—ah, how they spoke of Michelle!—into the royal closet. And the King, turning to him, said gently,—
“I wish to give you at once my reasons for wishing you to go to England and claim your estate, now that your half-brother is dead. I presume you have just arrived, although we have been expecting you any day for three months past.”
His half-brother dead. Roger felt a little unsteady on his legs for a moment.
“I—I—your Majesty—I did not know—I had not heard,” Roger stammered, and then hesitated, quivering all over with the suddenness of it.
“You did not know of Hugo Stein’s death? The Duke of Berwick will give you the particulars. You will understand, of course, that you are now the heir-at-law if your half-brother’s contention was right,—which no one believes,—that your father and Madame Stein were married. And if, as you have steadily maintained, your half-brother was a bastard, there is no one to dispute your claim, unless the Prince of Orange should. And I think there is little danger of that. He is an astute man, is my usurping son-in-law and nephew, and he dare not raise any further issue with the Egremonts. He has ceased forcing the oaths upon gentlemen certain to refuse them; so go you to England and claim your own, as soon as you like.”