64 The Castle Made for Love by Barbara Cartland

Author:Barbara Cartland
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: M-Y Books
Published: 2013-06-24T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Five

“It is really tremendously exciting!” Yola exclaimed.

Her eyes were sparkling and her lips smiling as she moved from exhibit to exhibit in the International Exhibition.

The Marquis had driven her there in his open chaise and she was thrilled from the moment they stepped into the enormous glass and iron building in the Champ de Mars on the Left Bank of the Seine.

There were fairgrounds and an Imperial Pavilion, which was an Oriental concept carried out with striped awnings and a multitude of golden eagles.

But the majority of the exhibits could be found in the Palais de l’Industrie and the different National Pavilions.

England was presenting a Bible Society kiosk, a Protestant Church, a model farm and machines for agriculture.

The Marquis laughed at it.

“Nothing could show more clearly,” he said to Yola, “the social and spiritual chasm that divides Victorian England from the Second Empire of France!”

It was the sort of remark that her father would have made and Yola fancied that the Marquis was testing her to see if she understood what he was trying to say,

“There is no lack of the exotic,” she murmured demurely, “if that is what you are looking for.”

They had already seen the Morocco tents, the Turkish Mosque and the Moslem sarcophagus. They had also visited the bamboo house from Japan and seen a porcelain pagoda in the garden presented by China.

“I want to know what you think of this,” the Marquis said.

Yola saw that he was pointing out a fifty-eight-ton steel gun manufactured by Krupp of Essen and displayed in the Prussian section.

As Yola stared at it he said,

“It is capable of firing a thousand-pound shell and the French newspapers regard it with a great deal of ironic amusement.”

Yola looked at him before she enquired,

“But you are taking it seriously.”

“I think if it was directed against us it could be very serious indeed,” the Marquis replied.

He moved Yola on to where there was an exhibit of a graceful new rifle, the chassepot.

“Is that the only weapon we have on show?” Yola asked in a low voice.

“There is a relief map of our Forts,” the Marquis replied, “which, last time I was here, was being studied with concentrated interest by a number of Prussian Officers.”

Yola knew exactly what he was trying to say and she felt a little shiver of fear in case those who talked of France going to war might prove to be right.

The preceding year the Austrians had suffered an unexpected defeat at the battle of Sadowa and the event had marked the emergence of Prussia as a military power.

Yola remembered how her father had said that the French would never tolerate the Germans menacing them on their frontiers.

Then she told herself that she was being needlessly apprehensive.

The whole country was at the moment intoxicated with pleasure and pride – pride in its machinery and its spectacular Army as well as pleasure in its money and its beautiful Capital.

“There will be peace in the future,” Yola murmured almost to herself.

“I wish we could be sure of that,” the Marquis replied.

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