For the time, at any rate, he had no idea whatever of returning to Scotland.  If better times came he had often thought that, if successful in winning a competency, he would return to his native land, for his close connection with the Scottish regiment kept alive in him his feeling of nationality, and he always regarded himself as a stranger in France.  The estates and title now bestowed upon him seemed to put this hope further away than ever, and to fix him permanently in France, a contingency more disagreeable to him the more he saw how completely France was dominated by faction, and how unstable were the conditions of life there.  His musings, therefore, as he walked up and down for hours, were very different from those which most young men would have felt at so great and sudden a change in their fortunes.

CHAPTER XI:  THE CASTLE OF LA VILLAR

The next morning he called at eleven o’clock, at which hour the cardinal’s secretary had informed him that Mazarin would expect him.  He went to the abode of the minister.  Mazarin received him with marked courtesy.

“Here are the deeds appointing to you the estate of la Villar and your patent of nobility,” he said, pointing to a box upon his table.  “You have been singularly fortunate, sir, and from all inquiries that I have made from officers who have served with Monsieur de Turenne, and, I may say, from Colonel Maclvor, I hear nothing but good of you, as a soldier devoted to duty, as a young man free from the vices and dissipations too common among those of your age, and as possessing intelligence as well as courage.  Such men, sir, even royalty does well to attach to itself, and for them a splendid career is open.  I, high as is the office in which Providence has placed me, may well envy you.  You fight against the enemies of France; I am surrounded by enemies open and secret, and the war is no less earnest than that which Turenne and Enghien are waging.

“The great nobles of France are jealous that I, a foreigner, should have the ear of the queen, and be first minister of the country.  Gladly indeed would I resign my position and return to my bishopric in Italy, were it not that I promised the great man to whose place I have so unworthily succeeded, that I would do my best for the country on whose behalf he spent every hour of his life, and that I would, unless driven from it by force, hold the seals of office until the young king should be old enough to rule France unaided.  You, baron, are like myself a foreigner, and ready to risk your life in the service of France, and you will understand how I am situated and how I feel.  You, happily for yourself, are not so highly placed as to excite enmity, although doubtless not a few of those who flocked round you yesterday evening to congratulate you on your good fortune felt a sensation of envy that a young soldier of fortune should be so honoured.