know what your Majesty is talking about.'

He flushed with anger for a moment, and then he burst out laughing.

'Very good, Brigadier!' he cried. 'I begin to believe that you are as
good a diplomatist as you are a soldier, and I cannot say more than
that.'

* * * * *

So that was my strange adventure in which I found myself the friend and
confident agent of the Emperor. When he returned from Elba he refrained
from digging up the papers until his position should be secure, and they
still remained in the corner of the old pigeon-house after his exile to
St Helena. It was at this time that he was desirous of getting them into
the hands of his own supporters, and for that purpose he wrote me, as I
afterwards learned, three letters, all of which were intercepted by his
guardians. Finally, he offered to support himself and his own
establishment--which he might very easily have done out of the gigantic
sum which belonged to him--if they would only pass one of his letters
unopened. This request was refused, and so, up to his death in '21, the
papers still remained where I have told you. How they came to be dug up
by Count Bertrand and myself, and who eventually obtained them, is a
story which I would tell you, were it not that the end has not yet come.

Some day you will hear of those papers, and you will see how, after he
has been so long in his grave, that great man can still set Europe
shaking. When that day comes, you will think of Etienne Gerard, and you
will tell your children that you have heard the story from the lips of
the man who was the only one living of all who took part in that strange
history--the man who was tempted by Marshal Berthier, who led that wild
pursuit upon the Paris road, who was honoured by the embrace of the
Emperor, and who rode with him by moonlight in the Forest of
Fontainebleau. The buds are bursting and the birds are calling, my
friends. You may find better things to do in the sunlight than listening
to the stories of an old, broken soldier. And yet you may well treasure
what I say, for the buds will have burst and the birds sung in many
seasons before France will see such another ruler as he whose servants
we were proud to be.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard
by Arthur Conan Doyle

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXPLOITS OF BRIGADIER GERARD ***

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