On a wet evening in May, the BrÉcÉ ladies were sitting together in the big drawing-room, knitting woollen bodices for the poor children of the village. Old Madame de Courtrai was standing with her back to the fire, holding up her skirts and warming her legs. The Duke, General Cartier de Chalmot, and M. Lerond were chatting, prior to a game of whist. The Duke opened the previous day’s paper that was lying upon the table.

“Hostilities between the Americans and the Spanish have not yet started in earnest,” he said. “What do you anticipate will be the outcome of it all, General? I should be very glad to have the opinion of so eminent a military authority as yourself.”

“It would certainly be very instructive if you would tell us what you think about the forces that are about to try their strength in the Antilles and in the China seas, General,” put in M. Lerond.

General Cartier de Chalmot passed his hand over his forehead, opened his mouth some time before he spoke, and then said in an authoritative manner:

“The Americans have committed a very imprudent act in declaring war on Spain, and it may well cost them dear. Having no army and no navy, it would be a difficult matter for them to keep up a struggle against an efficient army and a well-trained navy. They have their stokers and their enginemen, but stokers and enginemen do not make a battle fleet.”

“Do you think the Spaniards will win, General?” asked M. Lerond.

“Generally speaking, the success of a campaign depends upon circumstances impossible to prophesy,” replied the General. “But it may at once be stated that the Americans are not ready for war, and war necessitates long and careful preparation.”

“Come, General,” cried Madame de Courtrai, “tell us that these American wretches will be beaten!”

“Their success is doubtful,” replied the General. “I might even go so far as to say that it would be paradoxical, and an insolent contradiction of every system employed by those nations which are essentially military nations. As a matter of fact, the victory of the United States would constitute a condemnation of the principles adopted throughout Europe by the most competent soldiers, and such a result is neither likely nor desirable.”

“Good!” cried Madame de Courtrai, smacking her withered sides with her bony hands, and shaking her head, with its rough, grey locks that looked like a fur cap. “Good! our friends the Spaniards will be victorious! Vive le roi!”

“General,” said M. Lerond, “I am most interested in what you say. The success of our friends would be well received in France, and who knows if they might not be the means of stirring up a Royalist and clerical movement in this country!”

“Pardon me,” said the General. “I make no prophecy regarding the future. As I have said before, the success of a campaign depends upon circumstances impossible to foresee. All I can do is to take into consideration the quality of the conflicting elements, and from this point of view the advantage is certainly with Spain, although her fleet does not include a sufficiency of naval units.”

“Certain symptoms,” said the Duke, “would point to the fact that the Americans have already begun to repent of their temerity. I have heard it positively stated that they are panic-stricken. They live in daily dread of seeing the Spanish ironclads appear on their coasts. The inhabitants of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia are fleeing inland en masse; in fact, a general panic exists.” “Vive le roi!” repeated Madame de Courtrai, with fierce delight.

“What about little Honorine?” asked M. Lerond. “Is she still favoured with the visitations of Notre-Dame-des-Belles-Feuilles?”

“Yes,” replied the dowager duchess, with some embarrassment.

“It would be a good idea,” ventured the ex-deputy, “to make an official report of the child’s statements of what she sees and hears when in her trances.”

No reply was forthcoming to this remark, the reason being that, having undertaken to note down the words attributed by Honorine to the Blessed Virgin, Madame de BrÉcÉ very soon stopped doing so: the child’s expressions were not nice. Besides, M. le CurÉ TraviÈs, who was in the habit of shooting rabbits every evening in the woods of LÉnonville, had too often surprised Isidore and Honorine lying among the dead leaves to be any longer in doubt as to why they were there. M. TraviÈs was something of a poacher, but both his morals and his doctrine were sound. He gathered from repeated observations that it was hardly likely the Blessed Virgin would appear to Honorine.

He had spoken on the matter to the ladies of the castle, who were, if not convinced, at least somewhat perplexed. So when M. Lerond asked them for details of the latest ecstasies, they changed the subject.

“If you care to hear news from Lourdes,” said the dowager duchess, “we have some.”

“My nephew writes me that many miracles take place in the grotto,” said M. de BrÉcÉ.

“I have heard the same thing from one of my officers,” replied the General. “He is a promising young fellow, and has come back amazed at the wonderful things he saw there.”

“You know that the doctors in attendance at the piscina report the most miraculous cures?” said the Duke.

“We do not need the opinion of learned men to make us believe in miracles,” said Madame de BrÉcÉ with a limpid smile. “I have far more confidence in the Blessed Virgin than in any doctors.”

They then began to talk of the Affair, amazed, so they said, that the “syndicate of treachery” should continue its audacious manifestations unpunished. With much emphasis the Duke expressed himself as follows:

“When two courts martial have given their verdict, the smallest doubt can no longer exist.”

“Have you heard,” said Madame Jean, “that Mademoiselle Deniseau, the local prophetess, has learned from the mouth of St. Radegonde herself that Zola is going to become a naturalized Italian, and will not return to France?”

This prophecy was received with much favour.

A servant entered, bringing the letters.

“Perhaps there will be some news of the war,” said the Duke, opening a paper.

And in dead silence he read the following:

“Commodore Dewey has destroyed the Spanish fleet in the port of Manilla. The Americans have not lost a man.”

This telegram caused much depression in the drawing-room. The only person who continued to look confident was Madame de Courtrai, who cried:

“It’s not true!”

“The telegram,” said M. Lerond, “is an American one.”

“Yes,” said M. de BrÉcÉ, “we must beware of false news.”

All endorsed this prudent view of things, and yet were aghast at the sudden vision of a fleet, blessed by the Pope, bearing the flag of His Catholic Majesty, and carrying on the prow of her vessels the names of the Virgin and the saints, disabled, shattered, and sunk by the guns of bacon merchants, sewing-machine manufacturers, and heretics, by a nation without kings, without princes, without a history, without national traditions, and without an army.