“You herald the event after its occurrence, Colonel.”
And a moment later, folding up the sheet and returning it:
“His Imperial Highness certainly owes less to a fortuitous concourse of atoms than to his own ability, energy, and tact.” He added with emphasis: “This is an immense act; its importance can hardly be overestimated. For my part, I officially recognize it, and shall adhere to my determination to support it.”
Then, as Walewski, flushed with a triumph he could hardly control, murmured a gracefully-worded, low-toned entreaty, he responded:
“Ah! I understand. You wish me to write a line to His Imperial Highness, recapitulating what I have just said, to be conveyed with your own loyal congratulations by his messenger?...”
Walewski, unable to trust himself to speak, bowed assent. Perhaps the hand that held the tortoiseshell-rimmed eyeglasses knew a moment of unsteadiness as its owner’s swift brain balanced the question of risks. Then, with characteristic boldness, my lord took the leap.
“Certainly, my dear Count—certainly. I see no objection at all!”
And, with a slight jerky nod of dismissal for Dunoisse, accompanied by a not unkindly glance of the hard, powerful, dark brown eyes, the stooping figure of England’s great Foreign Minister moved forwards to the writing-table and penned the single, brief, emphatic line of approval, that burned the writer’s boats and brought about the downfall from which he was to rise, with popularity enhanced and power redoubled, within the space of a year.
An hour or so of fevered sleep in a luxurious bedroom, ringing with the clatter of late cabs and early milk-carts upon London paving-stones, and Dunoisse was on the iron road again. As he leaned back, with folded arms, in the first-class compartment that had no other passenger, his imagination followed Ada Merling back to the Hospice in Cavendish Street. But it was to a house in Park Lane that swiftly-trotting hoofs and rapidly-rolling wheels had carried her when she had left the Embassy on the night before.