THE COMMISSION
Lecour returned to the Hôtel de Noailles overwhelmed with
forebodings--one of those revulsions which come during long-continued
excitement.
"End the farce, fool," he exclaimed to himself despondently, hurrying to
the quarters of the Princess. She received him "in her bath,"--a
circumstance not unusual and which meant a covered foot-bath and a
handsome _déshabillé_ gown.
"Madame," he said. An emotion he could not quite hide caused him to
hesitate--"my days at Versailles are ended. I am come to present my
gratitude at your feet for the great kindness your Excellencies have
shown me. Believe, Madame----"
"Monsieur de Répentigny, you speak of leaving us?"
"It is too true."
"Truth is the only thing I find ill-mannered. Why should you leave us?"
"Because, Madame, it is my duty."
"No gentleman should have duties. Are you discontented with Versailles?"
"On the contrary it is the place where I should be most happy."
"This is a riddle, then. Plainly, you are indispensable to us. Can I
tempt you by some pension, some honour, some office? I have a benefice
vacant, but should dislike to see those locks of yours tonsured. What do
you say to the army?"
"It is impossible, for me."
"The army, I say, it shall be."
"Madame----"
"To-morrow I will hear your choice concerning this commission--horse,
foot, or artillery?"
One did not argue with Princesses--partly because Princesses did not
argue with one. He humbly retired, revolving an undefined notion of
flight.
By chance Grancey entered during the afternoon.
"Homesick, just at the nick of fortune? Do you know that a
sub-lieutenancy is vacant in my company? Sub-lieutenant, with rank of a
Colonel of Dragoons?"
"I did not."
"You must ask for it."
"That is out of the question, my lord." The gravity and humility of his
demeanour astonished Grancey, who surveyed him quizzically. "Is this a
new _rôle_, Répentigny, a part from _The Unconscious Philosopher_? Are
you ill?"
"I am leaving Versailles."
"Nonsense."
"And France."
"Never!"
"It is the case."
"But I have named you for the sub-lieutenancy."
Lecour looked up; but it was not enough to revive him from so deep a
slough.
"I must go, Baron."
"_Galimatias!_ You shall not throw away a commission in the Bodyguard of
the greatest Court in Europe. My brother-officers demand you, and you
must not desert me, your friend--your _friend_, Germain."
Germain went over to a window and looked out, to hide the tears with
which his eyes were filling. In the courtyard below a coach had stopped
at one of the doors. Cyrène was entering it. Why was she brought before
him just at that moment. This inopportune glimpse of her cancelled all
reasoning. With fevered sight he watched her till the coach disappeared,
and turning, said eagerly to de Grancey--
"Is not the Prince's consent required?"
"You agree!" Grancey cried, embracing him joyfully. "As to the Prince,
comrade," said he, "the sole difficulty is that he will grant anything
to anybody. We must get his signature--for which I admit it is delicate
to ask him--before any other applicant."
Lecour's pulses sprang back to life.
"Could the _Princess_ assist us?" he inquired.
"Perfect!" cried the Baron.
Germain returned to her apartment. The Abbé was handing her a paper and
saying--
"An entirely worthy gentleman, your Excellency, and wounded in several
of the King's victories, as well as of irreproachable descent."
Germain did not guess until it was too late that this was the petition
of the Chevalier de la Violette.
She was stretching out her hand to take the pen which Jude passed to
her.
"Madame," Lecour exclaimed breathlessly, "I have a prayer to make to you
immediately."
"Yes, Monsieur de Répentigny?"
"For a commission."
"Delightful."
"A vacant commission of sub-lieutenant in the company of the Prince."
She dropped the pen in wonder and looked at the Abbé Jude, whose face
turned sickly.
And so Germain obtained a great position.
"As a matter of form," said Major Collinot, the Adjutant of the
Bodyguard, at headquarters, "Monsieur de Répentigny of course proves the
necessary generations of _noblesse_?"
"Here is the herald's attestation, sir," replied Germain, producing that
which Grancey's intercession had obtained for him at Fontainebleau.
Doubly past the strictest tests of ancestry and reassured in boldness he
was now ready even to play cards with the dread Maréchale de
Noailles--her who it was reported once said, "That although our Lord was
born in a stable yet it must be remembered St. Joseph was of royal line
and not any common carpenter."
The pomp and glitter of the new life appealed immensely to the youthful
instincts of the Canadian. The Baron detailed to his fascinated listener
the composition, privileges, and duties of the Gardes--
"We are thirteen hundred, Répentigny, in four companies--the Scotch, the
Villeroy, the Noailles, and the Luxembourg, each over three hundred
persons; we relieve each other every three months. Just now it is the
turn of our company of Noailles. Of the three months, each man spends
one on guard at the Palace, one at the hunting-lodge, and one at
liberty; after that we withdraw to towns some distance apart, those of
the Noailles company to Troyes in Champagne." He told with pride of what
good stature and descent it was necessary to be to be received, how
keenly sought after even the commissions as privates were, hence the
fine picked appearance of the body. He dilated on the various
instruments and startling costumes of his company's band; on the style
of their horses and the magnificence of their reviews and parades; on
the superiority of the pale blue cross-belts which distinguished them,
over the silver and white ones of the Scotch company, the green of the
Villeroys, the yellow of the Luxembourgs. These differences, he
asserted, were the greatest distinctions under the sun.
Let us in our colder blood add to his description that each of
these companies consisted of one captain, one adjutant, two
lieutenant-commandants of squadron, three lieutenants, ten
sub-lieutenants, two standard-bearers, ten quartermasters, two
sub-quartermasters, twenty brigadiers or sergeants, two hundred and
eighty guards, one timbalier, and five trumpeters. Germain studied the
roll with great interest.