Adam Gould Read Online Free PDF Page A

comte de Chambord, now dead these dozen years, he sighed for the meanings of white flags. The comte’s refusal to adulterate his notion of himself as God’s appointed and swap his royal white flag for the tricolour had driven supporters crazy. In the secrecy of their dreams and in safe company they might insult the flag – ‘
drapeau de mon cul
’ – threaten to wipe themselves on it and rage at their leader’s obstinacy. Publicly, they brought their keenest eloquence to the attempt to make him budge. ‘For your own sake, Sire,’ they had pleaded, ‘for your followers’ sake, for France and for the Church, will you not sacrifice the symbol and grasp the reality? To win votes? To take power?’ The word intoxicated them. ‘Power,’ they cajoled repetitively while imploring him to show some flexibility. ‘Wisdom! Statesmanship! Remember your great predecessor and namesake, Henry IV! Was
he
wrong to compromise? He wasn’t, was he? So follow his example! Help God to help us!’ But no. He wouldn’t – and lost at the ballot box. He, as he saw it, owed it to God not to alter one tittle of his prerogatives and was as ramrod stiff as – well, as today’s visitor. Recalled to what was going on at this very moment outside the asylum gate, Belcastel laughed at the neatness with which it summed up his dilemma.
    ‘With all due respect to the First Commandment,’ he told himself, ‘it is an omen!’
    What had happened so far was this. His visitor, the vicomte de Sauvigny, had tried to climb the tall asylum gate and got stuck. It was a handsome, old, wrought-iron gate made up of curls and coils, and the toe of the vicomte’s boot had got caught in one of them. The foot inside this boot was on the outside of the gate, and by putting his weight on it, the vicomte had managed with some difficulty – he was forty-two and stiffer than he had supposed – to swing his other leg over the top, turn it and find a toe-hold on the inside. His two feet were now pointing in opposite directions, but he could liberate neither. He hadn’t the strength to swing back the foremost one, and his hind leg was held firmly in the coil of an iron curlicue. Possibly his enraged exertions had caused it to swell.
    ‘Will you come out, Monseigneur?’ The man who had come to report on all this asked Belcastel. ‘To calm him down?’
    ‘Yes, yes, of course I will!’
    Belcastel had immediately gone to look for his cape. Of course he’d come! The words ‘calm’ and ‘down’ were worrying. Things could turn nasty. Balm had better be poured! Head inside his opened wardrobe, he had begun poking speedily and impatiently through a smother of cassocks and batting away assaults by increasingly lively lengths of recalcitrant black wool. They all looked the same. Back and forth he went but, to his annoyance, failed to find the cape. Adam would know where it was, but where
was
Adam? Ah, he’d sent him away. Mm. Was that the cape? No. Belcastel’s irritable gesture sent something swinging, which returned and hit his nose rather hard. It was the sword which he had planned to lay casually on a side table. It was a ceremonial one which had been presented to his father in recognition of his gallantry at the battle of Castelfidardo. Fighting for the pope. ‘See,’ the sword was meant to have reminded the vicomte, ‘I, Belcastel, son of the hero of Castelfidardo, have every right to take issue with you. My loyalty is incontrovertible.’ In fact, of course, it was not – or rather, yes, it was, but subtlety, not swords, was Belcastel’s weapon. If the object of one’s loyalty were to split, what then? Just now there was a painful but vital matter to be addressed, which ... Never mind that. Find that cape! No point going out without it and getting pneumonia. Was his nose bleeding? God knew what was going on at the asylum gate. The monsignor was well aware how unbridled monarchist outbursts could be. Bad language would be the least of it. Seditious