CARDINAL FLEURY’S BLUNDER

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      Maréchal de Belleisle lay full length on a couch of saffron-coloured satin with his head raised on a pile of silk cushions.

      His room was one of the royal apartments in the Hradcany, and was most splendidly furnished with his own luxurious belongings: the floor was covered with a silk carpet; the walls hung with bright tapestry; the chairs were gilt and ash-wood; the many small tables held all manner of rich articles of gold, tortoiseshell, porcelain, and enamel, books richly bound, and caskets of sweets and preserved fruits. The light came entirely from crystal lamps suspended from gilt chains and supported by the ivory figures of flying cupids. A great clear fire burnt on the hearth, and near it was an ormolu writing-desk, on which were a few papers and a number of extravagant articles of gold and precious stones.

      The Maréchal was a man of middle life with an appearance denoting great pride and energy. He wore a white and scarlet brocade dressing-gown over black breeches and waistcoat of the extreme of fashion; his feet and legs were bandaged to the knee; the upper part of his person glittered with jewels—in the seals at his watch-chain, in the heavy lace at his throat, and on his strong, smooth fingers. His face was unnaturally pale and expressed a cold despair; his full brown eyes stared in absorbed trouble across the beautiful little room; and in his right hand he tightly grasped a letter from which swung the seals of France. He moved his head with a quick breath as his valet open the door and announced—

      “Monsieur le Duc de Broglie.”

      M. de Belleisle compressed his lips and his head sank back on the pillows again. M. de Broglie entered; the door closed behind him; he bowed and crossed to the fire.

      “Be seated,” said the Maréchal, with a bitter kind of courtesy.

      M. de Broglie brought his handkerchief to his lips with a little cough. He was splendidly attired in full uniform, but wore his bright chestnut hair unpowdered and tied with a turquoise ribbon. He was by some years younger than the Maréchal and a man of great charm in his appearance.

      “You have heard from Paris?” he asked, glancing at the letter the other held. “From M. de Fleury, Monsieur?” As he named the Minister who guided the affairs of France the Maréchal groaned. “From M. de Fleury?” he repeated, and looked sternly at the careless figure of M. de Broglie. He, the Maréchal de Belleisle, restless, ambitious, capable, confident, had planned this war. It was he who, dazzled by visions of acquiring for France a large portion of the possessions of the seemingly helpless Queen of Hungary, had travelled from court to court of the little states of Germany animating them against Maria Theresa; it was he who had persuaded Cardinal Fleury to offer the alliance of France to Frederick of Prussia when that prince seized Silesia; and it was he who had marched the French auxiliaries across the Rhine and successfully counter-moved Prince Lobkowitz and his Hungarians during several months of uneventful warfare.

      From the first he had never liked M. de Broglie; his feeling became bitter contempt when his illness left M. de Broglie in command and that General’s first action was to allow himself and almost the entire French force to be cornered in Prague.

      M. de Belleisle, though unable to stand or ride, had insisted on being carried into the city and reassuming his authority. Since then the relations of the two, in their open enmity, had been matter for comment to the whole army.

      M. de Broglie saw, however, to-night a stronger passion than aversion to himself in the Maréchal’s haggard face—saw, indeed, an expression that caused him to check the careless courtesies with which he was generally ready to vex his superior.

      “I see this is serious,” he remarked; “but you leave me, Monsieur, utterly at a loss.”

      The Maréchal made a restless movement on his sumptuous couch and half sat up, resting on his elbow. The long powdered curls that fell over his black solitaire and embroidered shirt were no more colourless than his face; his lips quivered and his eyes were narrowed as if he restrained pain.

      “M. de Broglie,” he said strongly, “you had better have been dead than have brought the army into Prague.”

      The younger General paled now, but raised his eyebrows haughtily; his right hand closed over the smooth red silk tassels of his sword.

      “This is an old subject, Monsieur,” he answered coldly. “I am ready to answer for my conduct at Versailles—I have told you so before.”

      “Versailles!” exclaimed the Maréchal grimly. “There are not many of us, Monsieur, who will see Versailles again.”

      M. de Broglie rose to his feet; the powerful firelight lent a false colour to his face.

      “What is your news from France, Maréchal?” he asked softly.

      With a fierce gesture M. de Belleisle cast down the letter he held.

      “This—we are to vacate Prague and join Maillelois at Eger—on the instant.”

      “It is not possible,” stammered M. de Broglie. The Maréchal interrupted him passionately—

      “My orders are there. The old man is in his dotage. Thirty leagues to Eger along unbroken ice—a retreat in this weather, when the men are dying under my eyes even in shelter.”

      The Duc de Broglie was startled and shocked beyond concealment.

      “It cannot be done!” he ejaculated.

      “There are my orders,” answered the Maréchal bitterly. “How many men does the Cardinal think I shall get to Eger? My God, it will be a disaster to make Europe stare—and the end of the war.”

      As he thought of the proud ambitions with which he had first meddled in the affairs of Austria, the difficulty he had had in wringing authority from Versailles for this alliance with Frederick of Prussia, the trouble to persuade that crafty King himself to accept the dangerous protection of France—as he thought of the splendid army he had poured into Bohemia, and saw now the end of that army and of the war in a catastrophe that would make France groan—and through no fault of his own, but because of the ignorant blunder of a foolish old priest in Paris—two haughty tears forced from his eyes and rolled down his thin cheeks.

      M. de Broglie was breathless as a tired runner; he put out his hand mechanically and grasped an enamelled snuff-box that lay among the frivolous trifles on the gilt desk.

      “M. de Fleury does not know,” he whispered, “either a Bohemian winter or the route from here to Eger.”

      The Maréchal fixed him with fierce wet eyes.

      “You are answerable for this, M. le Duc—you and you alone—and I must pay for your careless folly.”

      “Monsieur,” answered the other General, “I made Prague a shelter. I did not imagine that any sane man would order a retreat from it—in midwinter.”

      From the table near his couch M. de Belleisle took a map rudely drawn and coloured; he stared at the cross he had himself drawn which denoted Eger, the quarters of M. de Maillelois.

      “Sane!” he said furiously; “no one will think we are sane. King Frederick will laugh at us and curse too. Oh, if I were in Versailles or the old Cardinal here!”

      He rang the elegant bell on the table and his valet instantly appeared.

      “Draw the curtains,” ordered the Maréchal.

      The man pulled back the soft straw-coloured silk from the blackness of the window.

      “Open the casement.”

      The valet obeyed; a blast of frozen air set the lamp flickering.

      “What manner of night is it?” asked the Maréchal.

      “Snowing, Monseigneur,” shivered the valet.