On this occasion he seemed to have not wholly recovered from the storm
of the afternoon, and he looked about him with a brooding eye and a
lowering brow. It chanced that I was not very far from the door, and
that his glance fell upon me.
'Come here, Monsieur de Laval,' said he. He laid his hand upon my
shoulder and turned to a big, gaunt man who had accompanied him into the
room. 'Look here, Cambaceres, you simpleton,' said he. 'You always
said that the old families would never come back, and that they would
settle in England as the Huguenots have done. You see that, as usual,
you have miscalculated, for here is the heir of the de Lavals come to
offer his services. Monsieur de Laval, you are now my aide-de-camp, and
I beg you to keep with me wherever I go.'
This was promotion indeed, and yet I had sense enough to know that it
was not for my own sweet sake that the Emperor had done it, but in order
to encourage others to follow me. My conscience approved what I had
done, for no sordid motive and nothing but the love of my country had
prompted me; but now, as I walked round behind Napoleon, I felt
humiliated and ashamed, like a prisoner led behind the car of his
captor.
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