At the Sign of the Sword: A Story of Love and War in Belgium. Le Queux William
darling,” he said in a low voice, in English, so that none should overhear and understand, as he looked at her across the table, “that your father and his friends hold the money-strings of our little nation. They reckon the world by its millions of francs, and the finances of Belgium are in their hands. He will make the most strenuous effort to force you to marry Rigaux, and so strengthen the position of both houses.”
“I will never marry the man —never!” Aimée de Neuville declared emphatically in good English. “I hate him!”
“You swear that?” he demanded quickly, a fierce light suddenly in his eyes.
“I do, Edmond.”
“Ah?” he sighed in deep relief. “Then I am satisfied. Let us discuss the subject no further.”
And at that moment old Jules reappeared with the plate of tempting hors d’oeuvres and the carafe of vin-blanc ordinaire.
Edmond Valentin, the avocat, who struggled hard and fought for small fees in that most palatial Palais de Justice in the world, sat for a few moments gazing thoughtfully across the broad sunlit Meuse, where, on the opposite bank, a train, looking like a small toy, was following the bend of the river on its way to France, leaving a long trail of white smoke behind. He was thinking – thinking of something he knew – a secret – and as it arose in his mind his strong hands clenched themselves tightly beneath the table.
The girl, watching his countenance, wondered when she saw that strange expression of fierce hatred flit across his broad brow. But next second it had vanished, and smiling upon her, he began to help her to the anchovies and salad which the bald-headed waiter had placed before them.
They were truly a striking pair, she pretty and dainty, with a soft, sweet expression that men always found so charming, while he was particularly smart and handsome, without the slightest trace of foreign effeminacy, a fine, well-set-up fellow, who, but for the depth and largeness of his eyes, might easily have been mistaken for an Englishman. Yet their social positions were wide as the poles. She was the only child of Baron Henri de Neuville, the great financier, whose money controlled railways and tramways in half a dozen countries in Europe, and whose splendid old Château de Sévérac, higher up the river, was one of the show-places of Belgium. Ex-Minister of Finance and a member of the Senate, his position gave his wife, the Baroness, and her daughter, the entrée to the Court circle in Brussels, hence Aimée moved in the most exclusive set.
Her companion, however, was the son of the late Burgomaster of Ghent, an estimable man, who had amassed a considerable fortune and possessed much land around Antwerp, but who had, with hundreds of others, been completely ruined by dabbling in a wild-cat scheme on the Congo, and who had died penniless, save for the little pittance which his son Edmond could afford him.
Love, however, laughs at money-bags, and Aimée, while she was passionately fond of the man before her, detested that thin-faced, black-haired, narrow-eyed man, Monsieur Rigaux, whose praises the Baron was so constantly singing when they sat at table together. There was an indescribable look in the financier’s eyes which had, for the past four years – ever since she returned from school at Roedean – always frightened her. It was an expression which, though with her woman’s intuition she distrusted, yet she could neither describe it, nor the feeling which it always aroused within her. What we too often term natural antipathy, is a silent, mysterious warning which springs from our innermost conscience, and surely should never be dismissed.
The little cloud which had descended between the pair had quickly lifted, and as they sat eating their déjeuner, childishly happy in each other’s love, two officers of the 8th Chasseurs, in their braided tunics and undress caps, came along the terrasse, and, seeing a lady, saluted as they passed, and took seats at a little table at the farther end.
“My old regiment!” Edmond remarked. “Sometimes, Aimée, I regret that I resigned to take up law,” he added, with a sigh and a wistful look as he glanced at the two men in uniform.
“But you are making a name at the Courts,” the girl declared. “I read in the paper yesterday a case in which you are defending – the Affaire of the Rue du Trône, they call it – a murder-mystery.”
“Yes,” the man answered, with a touch of bitterness in his voice. “I am defending the man Sigart, though I myself am convinced of his guilt.”
“And yet you defend him?”
Edmond Valentin shrugged his shoulder.
“An advocate is forced to serve whichever side engages him,” he replied. “That is why the profession of arms is so much more honest.”
“Granted,” his companion said. “It gives you an entrée to the better houses – you can become a member of the Cercle Militaire, and all that, but is it not all useless? The war, which has been predicted all these years, has never come – nor, in my belief, will it ever come. Germany only raises a bogey from time to time, in order to terrify Europe, as my father puts it,” the girl added.
“Ah! I fear the Baron is a little too optimistic,” replied her lover. “War, when it comes – as it most assuredly will – will come in the hour when we least expect it. Then, when the Teuton hordes burst their bonds, woe-betide the nations they attack.”
“Well, Edmond, we have one consolation, that they will never attack us. We are neutral, and the Powers – even Germany herself – have agreed to respect our neutrality.”
“Ah, Aimée, that remains to be seen,” was his slow, apprehensive reply. “Germany, when she fights, will fight for world-wide power, irrespective of treaties or of agreements. The Kaiser is the great War Lord, and his intention is to vindicate his self-assumed title, and to rule the world.”
“Father, who is behind the scenes of international politics, quite disputes that view.”
“The Baron will not admit it – nobody in Belgium will admit it – because no cloud appears to-day upon the political horizon. But the dark cloud will arise ere long, depend upon it, and then we shall, every man of us, be compelled to fight for our lives, and for all we hold most dear.”
A silence fell between them. The young man slowly stirred his coffee, and then, taking a cigarette from his case, lit it, with a word of apology at having expressed such words of warning, and daring to disagree with the view held by the Baron de Neuville.
“But do you really fear war, Edmond?” asked the girl at last, having reflected deeply upon her lover’s words.
“Oh, I didn’t mean to alarm you, dearest,” he laughed quickly. “War will, I believe, break out in Europe; but not yet – probably not for years to come. Germany is not ready; and besides, she fears both France and England. Nevertheless, she is preparing to conquer the world. Of that, one has evidence everywhere in Germany.”
“My father does not believe it.”
“Because, like so many others all the world over who are piling up their money and reaping rich dividends, he does not wish to believe it. He, like millions of others, is content in the blissful paradise which he himself creates. But there, dearest, enough of my controversial subjects. Let us enjoy this glorious day,” and he blew a cloud of blue cigarette smoke from his lips, and laughed at her merrily across the little coffee-cup which he raised to his lips.
Then presently, Edmond having settled the account, the blissful pair entered the great grey car, in which Antoine, the Baron’s clean-shaven chauffeur, loyal to his young mistress, drove them rapidly away, up the white, winding road which led due east into the heart of the peaceful, picturesque Ardennes.
Chapter Two.
The Rising Cloud
A fortnight later – the second day of August, to be exact.
The Taverne Joseph, that popular restaurant in the Boulevard d’Anspach, in Brussels, where, beneath the shadow of the Bourse, the business-man gets such delicious plâts du jour, was crowded, as it always is each day at noon. The many little tables set out upon the pavement, along which the life of the bright little Belgian capital ebbed and flowed, were filled by