Grave was the evening côterie at the Café de l’Univers. The rumour had gone through France that England more than hesitated. Fortinbras magnificently defended England’s honour. He had been very quiet at home, tenderly shy and wistful with Félise, unsuggestive of paths to happiness with Martin; his attitude towards intimate life one of gentle melancholy. He had told Martin that he had retired from business as _Marchand de Bonheur_. He had lost the trick of it. At Bigourdin’s urgency he had purchased an annuity which sufficed his modest and philosophic needs. No longer having the fierce incentive to gain the hard-earned five-franc piece, no longer involved in a scheme of things harmonious with an irregular profession, he was like the singer deprived of the gift of song, the telepathist stricken with inhibitory impotence. For all his odd learning, for all his garnered knowledge of the human heart, and for all his queer heroic struggle, he stood before his own soul an irremediable failure. So an older and almost a broken Fortinbras had taken up his quarters at the Hôtel des Grottes. But stimulated by the talk of war, he became once more the orator and the seer. He held a brief for England and his passionate sincerity imposed itself on his hearers. “Thank God!” said he afterwards, “I was right.” But in the meanwhile, Martin, strung in every fibre to high pitch by what he had heard, by what he had seen and by what he had felt, knew that just as it was ordained that he should come to Brantôme, so it was ordained that he should not stay. “You talk eloquently and with conviction, Monsieur,” said the Mayor to Fortinbras—there were a dozen in the familiar café corner, tense and eager-eyed, and Monsieur Cazensac, the Gascon proprietor, stood by—“but what proofs have you given us of England’s co-operation?” Martin, with a thrill through his body, said in a loud voice: “Monsieur le Maire, there is not a living Englishman with red blood in his veins who has any doubt. I, the most obscure of Englishmen, speak for my country. Get me accepted as a volunteer, the humblest foot-soldier, and I will fight for France. Take up my pledge, Monsieur le Maire. It is the pledge of the only Englishman in Brantôme on behalf of the British Empire. There are millions better than I from all ends of the earth who will be inspired by the same sentiments of loyalty. Get me accepted!” In English Martin could never have said it. Words would have come shyly. But he was among Frenchmen, attuned to French modes of expression. A murmur of approbation arose. “Yes,” cried Martin. “I offer France my life as a pledge for my country. Get me accepted, _Monsieur le Maire_.” The Mayor, a lean, grey-eyed, bald-headed man, with a straggly, iron-grey beard, looked at him intently for a few moments.