Then followed a correct enumeration of Marshal Daun’s titles and honours. And at the very first glance Gavin recognized the handwriting of Frederick of Prussia. To make sure, he took from his breast pocket the treasured memorandum, which he always carried, that Frederick had given him the night of their adventure at Breslau. Yes, it was impossible to mistake that handwriting, and there was not the smallest attempt to disguise it on the mysterious letter. Gavin returned both to his safest pocket, and rode on steadily.
At one o’clock in the morning he and his two troopers clattered into the camp at Stolpen. He was at once shown to Marshal Daun’s headquarters, a peasant’s hut, in which a light was burning and a couple of hard-worked aides-de-camp were busy at a writing-table.
“The marshal has just gone into the inner room, but left orders that he should be aroused at once, should any dispatches come from General Loudon,” said one of them.
The marshal, however, saved them the trouble, for, hearing voices in the outer room, he appeared at the rude door that separated the rooms. He had lain down wrapped in his cloak, and it still hung about him.
Politely motioning Gavin to sit, he opened and read General Loudon’s dispatch, and promptly dictated a reply to his aide. When that was done, Gavin handed him the mysterious letter he had received, briefly recounting the circumstances under which he received it.
Marshal Daun read it attentively, and then, laying it down on the table, said with a puzzled air:
“This is very strange. This letter appears to be a reply to a letter I wrote General Fermor before the battle of Zorndorf, warning him against rashly engaging the King of Prussia, and expressing my high opinion of the King as a military man. I have had no word of reply to it until now, and this letter is not in General Fermor’s handwriting. I will read it to you.
“‘Your Excellency was in the right to warn me against a cunning enemy whom you knew better than I. Here have I tried fighting him and got beaten. Your unfortunate Fermor.’”
Gavin, taking Frederick’s letter from his pocket, silently laid it before the marshal, and Marshal Daun, after reading it, passed it over to his aides. A universal grin went around, not even excepting the grave and ceremonious field-marshal, at poor General Fermor’s expense.
“Well,” said Marshal Daun, after a moment, “the King of Prussia is entitled to his pleasantry. And I am sincerely glad he knows that I am incapable of one of the greatest faults of a soldier—underrating the enemy. I ever considered that king, since first I had the honour of fighting him, as one of the great masters of the art of war, and I have no objection to his knowing it. General Fermor did not know it, and behold, he was beaten at Zorndorf.”