One of Our Conquerors - World eBook Library

One of Our Conquerors
rousing animosity, damped the young Frenchwoman, even
to a revulsion when her feelings had been touched by hearing
praise of her France, and wounded by the subjects of the
praise. She bore the national scar, which is barely skin-clothing
of a gash that will not heal since her country was overthrown
and dismembered. Colney Durance could excuse the
unreasonableness in her, for it had a dignity, and she controlled
it, and quietly suffered, trusting to the steady, tireless,
concentrated aim of her France. In the Gallic mind of our
time, France appears as a prematurely buried Glory, that
heaves the mound oppressing breath and cannot cease; and
calls hourly, at times keenly, to be remembered, rescued from
the pain and the mould-spots of that foul sepulture. Mademoiselle
and Colney were friends, partly divided by her speaking
once of revanche; whereupon he assumed the chair of
the Moralist, with its right to lecture, and went over to the
enemy; his talk savoured of a German. Our holding of the
balance, taking two sides, is incomprehensible to a people
quivering with the double wound to body and soul. She was
of Breton blood. Cymric enough was in Nesta to catch any
thrill from her and join to her mood, if it hung out a colour
sad or gay, and was noble, as any mood of this dear Louise
would surely be.
Nataly was not so sympathetic. Only the Welsh and pure
Irish are quick at the feelings of the Celtic French. Nataly
came of a Yorkshire stock; she had the bravery, humaneness
and generous temper of our civilized North, and a taste for
mademoiselle’s fine breeding, with a distaste for the singular
air of superiority in composure which it was granted to mademoiselle
to wear with an unassailable reserve when the
roughness of the commercial boor was obtrusive. She said of
her to Colney, as they watched the couple strolling by the
lake below: ‘Nesta brings her out of her frosts. I suppose it’s
the presence of Dr. Schlesien. I have known it the same after
an evening of Wagner’s music.’
‘Richard Wagner Germanized ridicule of the French when
they were down,’ said Colney. ‘She comes of a blood that
never forgives.’
‘“Never forgives” is horrible to think of! I fancied you liked
your “Kelts,” as you call them.’
Colney seized on a topic that shelved a less agreeable one
that he saw coming. ‘You English won’t descend to under-
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