The value of the suggestion was obvious to Hornblower at once, and for days afterwards the women in the house were at work cutting and stitching and fitting, until the evening came when the three of them paraded before the Count in their neat coats of blue piped with white and red, and their rakish képis – it was the making of these which had taxed Marie’s ingenuity most, for the képi was still at that time an unusual headdress in the French government services. On Hornblower’s collar glittered the eight-pointed stars of colonel’s rank, and the top of his képi bore the gold-lace rosette; as the three of them rotated solemnly before the Count the latter nodded approvingly.
“Excellent,” he said, and then hesitated. “There is only one addition which I can think of to add realism. Excuse me a moment.”
He went off to his study leaving the others looking at each other, but he was back directly with a little leather case in his hand which he proceeded to open. Resting on the silk was a glittering cross of white enamel, surmounted by a golden crown and with a gold medallion in the centre.
“We must pin this on you,” he said. “No one reaches colonel’s rank without the Legion of Honour.”
“Father!” said Marie — it was rare that she used the familiar mode of address with him — “that was Louis-Marie’s.”
“I know, my dear, I know. But it may make the difference between Captain Hornblower’s success or — or failure.”
His hands trembled a little, nevertheless, as he pinned the scarlet ribbon to Hornblower’s coat.
“Sir — sir, it is too good of you,” protested Hornblower.
The Count’s long, mobile face, as he stood up, was sad, but in a moment he had twisted it into his usual wry smile.
“Bonaparte sent it to me,” he said, “after — after my son’s death in Spain. It was a posthumous award. To me of course it is nothing — the trinkets of the tyrant can never mean anything to a Knight of the Holy Ghost. But because of its sentimental value I should be grateful if you would endeavour to preserve it unharmed and return it to me when the war is over.”
“I cannot accept it, sir,” said Hornblower, bending to unpin it again, but the Count checked him.
“Please, Captain,” he said, “wear it, as a favour to me. It would please me if you would.”
More than ever after his reluctant acceptance did Hornblower’s conscience prick him at the thought that he had seduced this man’s daughter-in-law while enjoying his hospitality, and later in the evening when he found himself alone with the Count in the drawing room the conversation deepened his sense of guilt.
“Now that your stay is drawing to an end, Captain,” said the Count, “I know how much I shall miss your presence after you have gone. Your company has given me the very greatest pleasure.”
“I do not think it can compare with the gratitude I feel towards you, sir,” said Hornblower.
The Count waved aside the thanks which Hornblower was endeavouring awkwardly to phrase.
“A little while ago we mentioned the end of the war. Perhaps there will come an end some day, and although I am an old man perhaps I shall live to see it. Will you remember me then, and this little house beside the Loire?”
“Of course, sir,” protested Hornblower. “I could never forget.”
He looked round the familiar drawing room, at the silver candelabra, the old-fashioned Louis Seize furniture, the lean figure of the Count in his blue dress-coat.
“I could never forget you, sir,” repeated Hornblower.
“My three sons were all young when they died,” said the Count. “They were only boys, and perhaps they would not have grown into men I could have been proud of. And already when they went off to serve Bonaparte they looked upon me as an old-fashioned reactionary for whose views they had only the smallest patience — that was only to be expected. If they had lived through the wars we might have become better friends later. But they did not, and I am the last Ladon. I am a lonely man, Captain, lonely under this present regime, and yet I fear that when Bonaparte falls and the reactionaries return to power I shall be as lonely still. But I have not been lonely this winter, Captain.”