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diff --git a/17620-0.txt b/17620-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e3caae6 --- /dev/null +++ b/17620-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3806 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Point Of Honor, by Joseph Conrad + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Point Of Honor + A Military Tale + +Author: Joseph Conrad + +Illustrator: Dan Sayre Groesbeck + +Release Date: January 29, 2006 [EBook #17620] +Last Updated: March 2, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE POINT OF HONOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +THE POINT OF HONOR + +BY + +A MILITARY TALE + +BY + +JOSEPH CONRAD + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS BY DAN SAYRE GROESBECK + + +NEW YORK + +THE MCCLURE COMPANY + +MCMVIII + +Copyright, 1908, by The McClure Company + +Copyright, 1907, 1908, by Joseph Conrad + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + +“You will fight no more duels now” Frontispiece + +“Bowing before a sylph-like form reclining on a couch” + +“The angry clash of arms filled that prim garden” + +“You take the nearest brute, Colonel D'Hubert” + + + + +I + +Napoleon the First, whose career had the quality of a duel against the +whole of Europe, disliked duelling between the officers of his army. The +great military emperor was not a swashbuckler, and had little respect +for tradition. + +Nevertheless, a story of duelling which became a legend in the army runs +through the epic of imperial wars. To the surprise and admiration of +their fellows, two officers, like insane artists trying to gild refined +gold or paint the lily, pursued their private contest through the +years of universal carnage. They were officers of cavalry, and their +connection with the high-spirited but fanciful animal which carries men +into battle seems particularly appropriate. It would be difficult to +imagine for heroes of this legend two officers of infantry of the line, +for example, whose fantasy is tamed by much walking exercise and whose +valour necessarily must be of a more plodding kind. As to artillery, +or engineers whose heads are kept cool on a diet of mathematics, it is +simply unthinkable. + +The names of the two officers were Feraud and D'Hubert, and they were +both lieutenants in a regiment of hussars, but not in the same regiment. + +Feraud was doing regimental work, but Lieutenant D'Hubert had the good +fortune to be attached to the person of the general commanding the +division, as _officier d'ordonnance_. It was in Strasbourg, and in this +agreeable and important garrison, they were enjoying greatly a short +interval of peace. They were enjoying it, though both intensely warlike, +because it was a sword-sharpening, firelock-cleaning peace dear to a +military heart and undamaging to military prestige inasmuch that no one +believed in its sincerity or duration. + +Under those historical circumstances so favourable to the proper +appreciation of military leisure Lieutenant D'Hubert could have been +seen one fine afternoon making his way along the street of a cheerful +suburb towards Lieutenant Feraud's quarters, which were in a private +house with a garden at the back, belonging to an old maiden lady. + +His knock at the door was answered instantly by a young maid in Alsatian +costume. Her fresh complexion and her long eyelashes, which she lowered +modestly at the sight of the tall officer, caused Lieutenant D'Hubert, +who was accessible to esthetic impressions, to relax the cold, on-duty +expression of his face. At the same time he observed that the girl had +over her arm a pair of hussar's breeches, red with a blue stripe. + +“Lieutenant Feraud at home?” he inquired benevolently. + +“Oh, no, sir. He went out at six this morning.” + +And the little maid tried to close the door, but Lieutenant D'Hubert, +opposing this move with gentle firmness, stepped into the anteroom +jingling his spurs. + +“Come, my dear. You don't mean to say he has not been home since six +o'clock this morning?” + +Saying these words, Lieutenant D'Hubert opened without ceremony the +door of a room so comfortable and neatly ordered that only from internal +evidence in the shape of boots, uniforms and military accoutrements, did +he acquire the conviction that it was Lieutenant Feraud's room. And he +saw also that Lieutenant Feraud was not at home. The truthful maid had +followed him and looked up inquisitively. + +“H'm,” said Lieutenant D'Hubert, greatly disappointed, for he had +already visited all the haunts where a lieutenant of hussars could be +found of a fine afternoon. “And do you happen to know, my dear, why he +went out at six this morning?” + +“No,” she answered readily. “He came home late at night and snored. I +heard him when I got up at five. Then he dressed himself in his oldest +uniform and went out. Service, I suppose.” + +“Service? Not a bit of it!” cried Lieutenant D'Hubert. “Learn, my child, +that he went out so early to fight a duel with a civilian.” + +She heard the news without a quiver of her dark eyelashes. It was very +obvious that the actions of Lieutenant Feraud were generally above +criticism. She only looked up for a moment in mute surprise, and +Lieutenant D'Hubert concluded from this absence of emotion that she +must have seen Lieutenant Feraud since the morning. He looked around the +room. + +“Come,” he insisted, with confidential familiarity. “He's perhaps +somewhere in the house now?” + +She shook her head. + +“So much the worse for him,” continued Lieutenant D'Hubert, in a tone of +anxious conviction. “But he has been home this morning?” + +This time the pretty maid nodded slightly. + +“He has!” cried Lieutenant D'Hubert. “And went out again? What for? +Couldn't he keep quietly indoors? What a lunatic! My dear child....” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert's natural kindness of disposition and strong sense +of comradeship helped his powers of observation, which generally were +not remarkable. He changed his tone to a most insinuating softness; and +gazing at the hussar's breeches hanging over the arm of the girl, he +appealed to the interest she took in Lieutenant Feraud's comfort and +happiness. He was pressing and persuasive. He used his eyes, which were +large and fine, with excellent effect. His anxiety to get hold at +once of Lieutenant Feraud, for Lieutenant Feraud's own good, seemed so +genuine that at last it overcame the girl's discretion. Unluckily she +had not much to tell. Lieutenant Feraud had returned home shortly before +ten; had walked straight into his room and had thrown himself on his +bed to resume his slumbers. She had heard him snore rather louder than +before far into the afternoon. Then he got up, put on his best uniform +and went out. That was all she knew. + +She raised her candid eyes up to Lieutenant D'Hubert, who stared at her +incredulously. + +“It's incredible. Gone parading the town in his best uniform! My dear +child, don't you know that he ran that civilian through this morning? +Clean through as you spit a hare.” + +She accepted this gruesome intelligence without any signs of distress. +But she pressed her lips together thoughtfully. + +“He isn't parading the town,” she remarked, in a low tone. “Far from +it.” + +“The civilian's family is making an awful row,” continued Lieutenant +D'Hubert, pursuing his train of thought. “And the general is very angry. +It's one of the best families in the town. Feraud ought to have kept +close at least....” + +“What will the general do to him?” inquired the girl anxiously. + +“He won't have his head cut off, to be sure,” answered Lieutenant +D'Hubert. “But his conduct is positively indecent. He's making no end of +trouble for himself by this sort of bravado.” + +“But he isn't parading the town,” the maid murmured again. + +“Why, yes! Now I think of it. I haven't seen him anywhere. What on earth +has he done with himself?” + +“He's gone to pay a call,” suggested the maid, after a moment of +silence. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert was surprised. “A call! Do you mean a call on a +lady? The cheek of the man. But how do you know this?” + +Without concealing her woman's scorn for the denseness of the masculine +mind, the pretty maid reminded him that Lieutenant Feraud had arrayed +himself in his best uniform before going out. He had also put on his +newest dolman, she added in a tone as if this conversation were getting +on her nerves and turned away brusquely. Lieutenant D'Hubert, without +questioning the accuracy of the implied deduction, did not see that it +advanced him much on his official quest. For his quest after Lieutenant +Feraud had an official character. He did not know any of the women this +fellow who had run a man through in the morning was likely to call on in +the afternoon. The two officers knew each other but slightly. He bit his +gloved finger in perplexity. + +“Call!” he exclaimed. “Call on the devil.” The girl, with her back to +him and folding the hussar's breeches on a chair, said with a vexed +little laugh: + +“Oh, no! On Madame de Lionne.” Lieutenant D'Hubert whistled softly. +Madame de Lionne, the wife of a high official, had a well-known salon +and some pretensions to sensibility and elegance. The husband was a +civilian and old, but the society of the salon was young and military +for the greater part. Lieutenant D'Hubert had whistled, not because the +idea of pursuing Lieutenant Feraud into that very salon was in the least +distasteful to him, but because having but lately arrived in Strasbourg +he had not the time as yet to get an introduction to Madame de Lionne. +And what was that swashbuckler Feraud doing there? He did not seem the +sort of man who... + +“Are you certain of what you say?” asked Lieutenant D'Hubert. + +The girl was perfectly certain. Without turning round to look at him +she explained that the coachman of their next-door neighbours knew +the _maitre-d'hôtel_ of Madame de Lionne. In this way she got her +information. And she was perfectly certain. In giving this assurance she +sighed. Lieutenant Feraud called there nearly every afternoon. + +“Ah, bah!” exclaimed D'Hubert ironically. His opinion of Madame de +Lionne went down several degrees. Lieutenant Feraud did not seem to him +specially worthy of attention on the part of a woman with a reputation +for sensibility and elegance. But there was no saying. At bottom they +were all alike--very practical rather than idealistic. Lieutenant +D'Hubert, however, did not allow his mind to dwell on these +considerations. “By thunder!” he reflected aloud. “The general goes +there sometimes. If he happens to find the fellow making eyes at +the lady there will be the devil to pay. Our general is not a very +accommodating person, I can tell you.” + +“Go quickly then. Don't stand here now I've told you where he is,” cried +the girl, colouring to the eyes. + +“Thanks, my dear. I don't know what I would have done without you.” + +After manifesting his gratitude in an aggressive way which at first was +repulsed violently and then submitted to with a sudden and still more +repellent indifference, Lieutenant D'Hubert took his departure. + +He clanked and jingled along the streets with a martial swagger. To +run a comrade to earth in a drawing-room where he was not known did not +trouble him in the least. A uniform is a social passport. His position +as _officier d'ordonnance_ of the general added to his assurance. +Moreover, now he knew where to find Lieutenant Feraud, he had no option. +It was a service matter. + +Madame de Lionne's house had an excellent appearance. A man in livery +opening the door of a large drawing-room with a waxed floor, shouted his +name and stood aside to let him pass. It was a reception day. The +ladies wearing hats surcharged with a profusion of feathers, sheathed in +clinging white gowns from their armpits to the tips of their low satin +shoes, looked sylphlike and cool in a great display of bare necks +and arms. The men who talked with them, on the contrary, were arrayed +heavily in ample, coloured garments with stiff collars up to their +ears and thick sashes round their waists. Lieutenant D'Hubert made his +unabashed way across the room, and bowing low before a sylphlike form +reclining on a couch, offered his apologies for this intrusion, which +nothing could excuse but the extreme urgency of the service order he +had to communicate to his comrade Feraud. He proposed to himself to come +presently in a more regular manner and beg forgiveness for interrupting +this interesting conversation.... + +A bare arm was extended to him with gracious condescension even before +he had finished speaking. He pressed the hand respectfully to his lips +and made the mental remark that it was bony. Madame de Lionne was a +blonde with too fine a skin and a long face. + +“_C'est ça!_” she said, with an ethereal smile, disclosing a set of +large teeth. “Come this evening to plead for your forgiveness.” + +“I will not fail, madame.” + +Meantime Lieutenant Feraud, splendid in his new dolman and the extremely +polished boots of his calling, sat on a chair within a foot of the couch +and, one hand propped on his thigh, with the other twirled his moustache +to a point without uttering a sound. At a significant glance from +D'Hubert he rose without alacrity and followed him into the recess of a +window. + +“What is it you want with me?” he asked in a tone of annoyance, which +astonished not a little the other. Lieutenant D'Hubert could not imagine +that in the innocence of his heart and simplicity of his conscience +Lieutenant Feraud took a view of his duel in which neither remorse +nor yet a rational apprehension of consequences had any place. Though +Lieutenant Feraud had no clear recollection how the quarrel had +originated (it was begun in an establishment where beer and wine are +drunk late at night), he had not the slightest doubt of being himself +the outraged party. He had secured two experienced friends or his +seconds. Everything had been done according to the rules governing that +sort of adventure. And a duel is obviously fought for the purpose of +someone being at least hurt if not killed outright. The civilian got +hurt. That also was in order. Lieutenant Feraud was perfectly tranquil. +But Lieutenant D'Hubert mistook this simple attitude for affectation and +spoke with some heat. + +“I am directed by the general to give you the order to go at once to +your quarters and remain there under close arrest.” + +It was now the turn of Lieutenant Feraud to be astonished. + +“What the devil are you telling me there?” he murmured faintly, and fell +into such profound wonder that he could only follow mechanically the +motions of Lieutenant D'Hubert. The two officers--one tall, with an +interesting face and a moustache the colour of ripe corn, the other +short and sturdy, with a hooked nose and a thick crop of black, curly +hair--approached the mistress of the house to take their leave. Madame +de Lionne, a woman of eclectic taste, smiled upon these armed young men +with impartial sensibility and an equal share of interest. Madame de +Lionne took her delight in the infinite variety of the human species. +All the eyes in the drawing-room followed the departing officers, one +strutting, the other striding, with curiosity. When the door had closed +after them one or two men who had already heard of the duel imparted the +information to the sylphlike ladies, who received it with little shrieks +of humane concern. + +Meantime the two hussars walked side by side, Lieutenant Feraud trying +to fathom the hidden reason of things which in this instance eluded the +grasp of his intellect; Lieutenant D'Hubert feeling bored by the part he +had to play; because the general's instructions were that he should see +personally that Lieutenant Feraud carried out his orders to the letter +and at once. + +“The chief seems to know this animal,” he thought, eyeing his companion, +whose round face, the round eyes and even the twisted-up jet black +little moustache seemed animated by his mental exasperation before +the incomprehensible. And aloud he observed rather reproachfully, “The +general is in a devilish fury with you.” + +Lieutenant Feraud stopped short on the edge of the pavement and cried +in the accents of unmistakable sincerity: “What on earth for?” The +innocence of the fiery Gascon soul was depicted in the manner in which +he seized his head in both his hands as if to prevent it bursting with +perplexity. + +“For the duel,” said Lieutenant D'Hubert curtly. He was annoyed greatly +by this sort of perverse fooling. + +“The duel! The...” + +Lieutenant Feraud passed from one paroxysm of astonishment into another. +He dropped his hands and walked on slowly trying to reconcile this +information with the state of his own feelings. It was impossible. He +burst out indignantly: + +“Was I to let that sauerkraut-eating civilian wipe his boots on the +uniform of the Seventh Hussars?” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert could not be altogether unsympathetic toward that +sentiment. This little fellow is a lunatic, he thought to himself, but +there is something in what he says. + +“Of course, I don't know how far you were justified,” he said +soothingly. “And the general himself may not be exactly informed. A lot +of people have been deafening him with their lamentations.” + +“Ah, he is not exactly informed,” mumbled Lieutenant Feraud, walking +faster and faster as his choler at the injustice of his fate began to +rise. “He is not exactly.... And he orders me under close arrest with +God knows what afterward.” + +“Don't excite yourself like this,” remonstrated the other. “That young +man's people are very influential, you know, and it looks bad enough +on the face of it. The general had to take notice of their complaint at +once. I don't think he means to be over-severe with you. It is best for +you to be kept out of sight for a while.” + +“I am very much obliged to the general,” muttered Lieutenant Feraud +through his teeth. + +“And perhaps you would say I ought to be grateful to you too for the +trouble you have taken to hunt me up in the drawing-room of a lady +who...” + +“Frankly,” interrupted Lieutenant D'Hubert, with an innocent laugh, “I +think you ought to be. I had no end of trouble to find out where you +were. It wasn't exactly the place for you to disport yourself in under +the circumstances. If the general had caught you there making eyes at +the goddess of the temple.... Oh, my word!... He hates to be bothered +with complaints against his officers, you know. And it looked uncommonly +like sheer bravado.” + +The two officers had arrived now at the street door of Lieutenant +Feraud's lodgings. The latter turned toward his companion. “Lieutenant +D'Hubert,” he said, “I have something to say to you which can't be said +very well in the street. You can't refuse to come in.” + +The pretty maid had opened the door. Lieutenant Feraud brushed past +her brusquely and she raised her scared, questioning eyes to Lieutenant +D'Hubert, who could do nothing but shrug his shoulders slightly as he +followed with marked reluctance. + +In his room Lieutenant Feraud unhooked the clasp, flung his new dolman +on the bed, and folding his arms across his chest, turned to the other +hussar. + +“Do you imagine I am a man to submit tamely to injustice?” he inquired +in a boisterous voice. + +“Oh, do be reasonable,” remonstrated Lieutenant D'Hubert. + +“I am reasonable. I am perfectly reasonable,” retorted the other, +ominously lowering his voice. “I can't call the general to account for +his behaviour, but you are going to answer to me for yours.” + +“I can't listen to this nonsense,” murmured Lieutenant D'Hubert, making +a slightly contemptuous grimace. + +“You call that nonsense. It seems to me perfectly clear. Unless you +don't understand French.” + +“What on earth do you mean?” + +“I mean,” screamed suddenly Lieutenant Feraud, “to cut off your ears to +teach you not to disturb me, orders or no orders, when I am talking to a +lady.” + +A profound silence followed this mad declaration--and through the open +window Lieutenant D'Hubert heard the little birds singing sanely in the +garden. He said coldly: + +“Why! If you take that tone, of course I will hold myself at your +disposal whenever you are at liberty to attend to this affair. But I +don't think you will cut off my ears.” + +“I am going to attend to it at once,” declared Lieutenant Feraud, with +extreme truculence. “If you are thinking of displaying your airs and +graces to-night in Madame de Lionne's salon you are very much mistaken.” + +“Really,” said Lieutenant D'Hubert, who was beginning to feel irritated, +“you are an impracticable sort of fellow. The general's orders to +me were to put you under arrest, not to carve you into small pieces. +Good-morning.” Turning his back on the little Gascon who, always sober +in his potations, was as though born intoxicated, with the sunshine +of his wine-ripening country, the northman, who could drink hard on +occasion, but was born sober under the watery skies of Picardy, made +calmly for the door. Hearing, however, the unmistakable sound, behind +his back, of a sword drawn from the scabbard, he had no option but to +stop. + +“Devil take this mad Southerner,” he thought, spinning round and +surveying with composure the warlike posture of Lieutenant Feraud with +the unsheathed sword in his hand. + +“At once. At once,” stuttered Feraud, beside himself. + +“You had my answer,” said the other, keeping his temper very well. + +At first he had been only vexed and somewhat amused. But now his face +got clouded. He was asking himself seriously how he could manage to get +away. Obviously it was impossible to run from a man with a sword, and as +to fighting him, it seemed completely out of the question. + +He waited awhile, then said exactly what was in his heart: + +“Drop this; I won't fight you now. I won't be made ridiculous.” + +“Ah, you won't!” hissed the Gascon. “I suppose you prefer to be made +infamous. Do you hear what I say?... Infamous! Infamous! Infamous!” he +shrieked, raising and falling on his toes and getting very red in the +face. Lieutenant D'Hubert, on the contrary, became very pale at the +sound of the unsavoury word, then flushed pink to the roots of his fair +hair. + +“But you can't go out to fight; you are under arrest, you lunatic,” he +objected, with angry scorn. + +“There's the garden. It's big enough to lay out your long carcass in,” + spluttered out Lieutenant Feraud with such ardour that somehow the anger +of the cooler man subsided. + +“This is perfectly absurd,” he said, glad enough to think he had found a +way out of it for the moment. “We will never get any of our comrades to +serve as seconds. It's preposterous.” + +“Seconds! Damn the seconds! We don't want any seconds. Don't you worry +about any seconds. I will send word to your friends to come and bury +you when I am done. This is no time for ceremonies. And if you want +any witnesses, I'll send word to the old girl to put her head out of a +window at the back. Stay! There's the gardener. He'll do. He's as deaf +as a post, but he has two eyes in his head. Come along. I will teach +you, my staff officer, that the carrying about of a general's orders is +not always child's play.” + +While thus discoursing he had unbuckled his empty scabbard. He sent it +flying under the bed, and, lowering the point of the sword, brushed past +the perplexed Lieutenant D'Hubert, crying: “Follow me.” Directly he had +flung open the door a faint shriek was heard, and the pretty maid, who +had been listening at the keyhole, staggered backward, putting the backs +of her hands over her eyes. He didn't seem to see her, but as he was +crossing the anteroom she ran after him and seized his left arm. He +shook her off and then she rushed upon Lieutenant D'Hubert and clawed at +the sleeve of his uniform. + +“Wretched man,” she sobbed despairingly. “Is this what you wanted to +find him for?” + +“Let me go,” entreated Lieutenant D'Hubert, trying to disengage himself +gently. “It's like being in a madhouse,” he protested with exasperation. +“Do let me go, I won't do him any harm.” + +A fiendish laugh from Lieutenant Feraud commented that assurance. “Come +along,” he cried impatiently, with a stamp of his foot. + +And Lieutenant D'Hubert did follow. He could do nothing else. But in +vindication of his sanity it must be recorded that as he passed out +of the anteroom the notion of opening the street door and bolting out +presented itself to this brave youth, only, of course, to be instantly +dismissed: for he felt sure that the other would pursue him without +shame or compunction. And the prospect of an officer of hussars being +chased along the street by another officer of hussars with a naked sword +could not be for a moment entertained. Therefore he followed into the +garden. Behind them the girl tottered out too. With ashy lips and wild, +scared eyes, she surrendered to a dreadful curiosity. She had also +a vague notion of rushing, if need be, between Lieutenant Feraud and +death. + +The deaf gardener, utterly unconscious of approaching footsteps, went +on watering his flowers till Lieutenant Feraud thumped him on the back. +Beholding suddenly an infuriated man, flourishing a big sabre, the old +chap, trembling in all his limbs, dropped the watering pot. At once +Lieutenant Feraud kicked it away with great animosity; then seizing the +gardener by the throat, backed him against a tree and held him there +shouting in his ear: + +“Stay here and look on. You understand you've got to look on. Don't dare +budge from the spot.” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert, coming slowly down the walk, unclasped his dolman +with undisguised reluctance. Even then, with his hand already on his +sword, he hesitated to draw, till a roar “_En garde, fichtre!_ What do +you think you came here for?” and the rush of his adversary forced him +to put himself as quickly as possible in a posture of defence. + +The angry clash of arms filled that prim garden, which hitherto had +known no more warlike sound than the click of clipping shears; and +presently the upper part of an old lady's body was projected out of +a window upstairs. She flung her arms above her white cap, and began +scolding in a thin, cracked voice. The gardener remained glued to the +tree looking on, his toothless mouth open in idiotic astonishment, and +a little farther up the walk the pretty girl, as if held by a spell, +ran to and fro on a small grass plot, wringing her hands and muttering +crazily. She did not rush between the combatants. The onslaughts of +Lieutenant Feraud were so fierce that her heart failed her. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert, his faculties concentrated upon defence, needed all +his skill and science of the sword to stop the rushes of his adversary. +Twice already he had had to break ground. + +[Illustration: 028.jpg “The angry clash of arms filled that prim +garden”] + +It bothered him to feel his foothold made insecure by the round dry +gravel of the path rolling under the hard soles of his boots. This was +most unsuitable ground, he thought, keeping a watchful, narrowed +gaze shaded by long eyelashes upon the fiery staring eyeballs of his +thick-set adversary. This absurd affair would ruin his reputation of a +sensible, steady, promising young officer. It would damage, at any rate, +his immediate prospects and lose him the good will of his general. These +worldly preoccupations were no doubt misplaced in view of the solemnity +of the moment. For a duel whether regarded as a ceremony in the cult of +honour or even when regrettably casual and reduced in its moral essence +to a distinguished form of manly sport, demands perfect singleness of +intention, a homicidal austerity of mood. On the other hand, this vivid +concern for the future in a man occupied in keeping sudden death at +sword's length from his breast, had not a bad effect, inasmuch as it +began to rouse the slow anger of Lieutenant D'Hubert. Some seventy +seconds had elapsed since they had crossed steel and Lieutenant D'Hubert +had to break ground again in order to avoid impaling his reckless +adversary like a beetle for a cabinet of specimens. The result was that, +misapprehending the motive, Lieutenant Feraud, giving vent to triumphant +snarls, pressed his attack with renewed vigour. + +This enraged animal, thought D'Hubert, will have me against the wall +directly. He imagined himself much closer to the house than he was; and +he dared not turn his head, such an act under the circumstances being +equivalent to deliberate suicide. It seemed to him that he was +keeping his adversary off with his eyes much more than with his point. +Lieutenant Feraud crouched and bounded with a tigerish, ferocious +agility--enough to trouble the stoutest heart. But what was more +appalling than the fury of a wild beast accomplishing in all innocence +of heart a natural function, was the fixity of savage purpose man +alone is capable of displaying. Lieutenant D'Hubert in the midst of +his worldly preoccupations perceived it at last. It was an absurd and +damaging affair to be drawn into. But whatever silly intention the +fellow had started with, it was clear that by this time he meant to +kill--nothing else. He meant it with an intensity of will utterly beyond +the inferior faculties of a tiger. + +As is the case with constitutionally brave men, the full view of the +danger interested Lieutenant D'Hubert. And directly he got properly +interested, the length of his arm and the coolness of his head told in +his favour. It was the turn of Lieutenant Feraud to recoil. He did this +with a blood-curdling grunt of baffled rage. He made a swift feint and +then rushed straight forward. + +“Ah! you would, would you?” Lieutenant D'Hubert exclaimed mentally to +himself. The combat had lasted nearly two minutes, time enough for any +man to get embittered, apart from the merits of the quarrel. And all at +once it was over. Trying to close breast to breast under his adversary's +guard, Lieutenant Feraud received a slash on his shortened arm. He did +not feel it in the least, but it checked his rush, and his feet slipping +on the gravel, he fell backward with great violence. The shock +jarred his boiling brain into the perfect quietude of insensibility. +Simultaneously with his fall the pretty servant girl shrieked +piercingly; but the old maiden lady at the window ceased her scolding +and with great presence of mind began to cross herself. + +In the first moment, seeing his adversary lying perfectly still, his +face to the sky and his toes turned up, Lieutenant D'Hubert thought he +had killed him outright. The impression of having slashed hard enough +to cut his man clean in two abode with him for awhile in an exaggerated +impression of the right good will he had put into the blow. He went down +on his knees by the side of the prostrate body. Discovering that not +even the arm was severed, a slight sense of disappointment mingled with +the feeling of relief. But, indeed, he did not want the death of that +sinner. The affair was ugly enough as it stood. Lieutenant D'Hubert +addressed himself at once to the task of stopping the bleeding. In this +task it was his fate to be ridiculously impeded by the pretty maid. The +girl, filling the garden with cries for help, flung herself upon his +defenceless back and, twining her fingers in his hair, tugged at his +head. Why she should choose to hinder him at this precise moment he +could not in the least understand. He did not try. It was all like +a very wicked and harassing dream. Twice, to save himself from being +pulled over, he had to rise and throw her off. He did this stoically, +without a word, kneeling down again at once to go on with his work. But +when the work was done he seized both her arms and held them down. Her +cap was half off, her face was red, her eyes glared with crazy boldness. +He looked mildly into them while she called him a wretch, a traitor and +a murderer many times in succession. This did not annoy him so much as +the conviction that in her scurries she had managed to scratch his face +abundantly. Ridicule would be added to the scandal of the story. He +imagined it making its way through the garrison, through the whole army, +with every possible distortion of motive and sentiment and circumstance, +spreading a doubt upon the sanity of his conduct and the distinction of +his taste even into the very bosom of his honourable family. It was all +very well for that fellow Feraud, who had no connections, no family +to speak of, and no quality but courage which, anyhow, was a matter +of course, and possessed by every single trooper in the whole mass of +French cavalry. Still holding the wrists of the girl in a strong grip, +Lieutenant D'Hubert looked over his shoulder. Lieutenant Feraud had +opened his eyes. He did not move. Like a man just waking from a deep +sleep he stared with a drowsy expression at the evening sky. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert's urgent shouts to the old gardener produced no +effect--not so much as to make him shut his toothless mouth. Then +he remembered that the man was stone deaf. All that time the girl, +attempting to free her wrists, struggled, not with maidenly coyness but +like a sort of pretty dumb fury, not even refraining from kicking +his shins now and then. He continued to hold her as if in a vice, his +instinct telling him that were he to let her go she would fly at his +eyes. But he was greatly humiliated by his position. At last she gave +up, more exhausted than appeased, he feared. Nevertheless he attempted +to get out of this wicked dream by way of negotiation. + +“Listen to me,” he said as calmly as he could. “Will you promise to run +for a surgeon if I let you go?” + +He was profoundly afflicted when, panting, sobbing, and choking, she +made it clear that she would do nothing of the kind. On the contrary, +her incoherent intentions were to remain in the garden and fight with +her nails and her teeth for the protection of the prostrate man. This +was horrible. + +“My dear child,” he cried in despair, “is it possible that you think me +capable of murdering a wounded adversary? Is it.... Be quiet, you little +wildcat, you,” he added. + +She struggled. A thick sleepy voice said behind him: + +“What are you up to with that girl?” + +Lieutenant Feraud had raised himself on his good arm. He was looking +sleepily at his other arm, at the mess of blood on his uniform, at a +small red pool on the ground, at his sabre lying a foot away on the +path. Then he laid himself down gently again to think it all out as far +as a thundering headache would permit of mental operations. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert released the girl's wrists. She flew away down the +path and crouched wildly by the side of the vanquished warrior. The +shades of night were falling on the little trim garden with this +touching group whence proceeded low murmurs of sorrow and compassion +with other feeble sounds of a different character as if an imperfectly +awake invalid were trying to swear. Lieutenant D'Hubert went away, too +exasperated to care what would happen. + +He passed through the silent house and congratulated himself upon the +dusk concealing his gory hands and scratched face from the passers-by. +But this story could by no means be concealed. He dreaded the discredit +and ridicule above everything, and was painfully aware of sneaking +through the back streets to his quarters. In one of these quiet side +streets the sounds of a flute coming out of the open window of a lighted +upstairs room in a modest house interrupted his dismal reflections. It +was being played with a deliberate, persevering virtuosity, and through +the _fioritures_ of the tune one could even hear the thump of the foot +beating time on the floor. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert shouted a name which was that of an army surgeon +whom he knew fairly well. The sounds of the flute ceased and the +musician appeared at the window, his instrument still in his hand, +peering into the street. + +“Who calls? You, D'Hubert! What brings you this way?” + +He did not like to be disturbed when he was playing the flute. He was a +man whose hair had turned gray already in the thankless task of tying up +wounds on battlefields where others reaped advancement and glory. + +“I want you to go at once and see Feraud. You know Lieutenant Feraud? He +lives down the second street. It's but a step from here.” + +“What's the matter with him?” + +“Wounded.” + +“Are you sure?” + +“Sure!” cried D'Hubert. “I come from there.” + +“That's amusing,” said the elderly surgeon. Amusing was his favourite +word; but the expression of his face when he pronounced it never +corresponded. He was a stolid man. “Come in,” he added. “I'll get ready +in a moment.” + +“Thanks. I will. I want to wash my hands in your room.” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert found the surgeon occupied in unscrewing his flute +and packing the pieces methodically in a velvet-lined case. He turned +his head. + +“Water there--in the corner. Your hands do want washing.” + +“I've stopped the bleeding,” said Lieutenant D'Hubert. “But you had +better make haste. It's rather more than ten minutes ago, you know.” + +The surgeon did not hurry his movements. + +“What's the matter? Dressing came off? That's amusing. I've been busy +in the hospital all day, but somebody has told me that he hadn't a +scratch.” + +“Not the same duel probably,” growled moodily Lieutenant D'Hubert, +wiping his hands on a coarse towel. + +“Not the same.... What? Another? It would take the very devil to make +me go out twice in one day.” He looked narrowly at Lieutenant +D'Hubert. “How did you come by that scratched face? Both sides too--and +symmetrical. It's amusing.” + +“Very,” snarled Lieutenant D'Hubert. “And you will find his slashed arm +amusing too. It will keep both of you amused for quite a long time.” + +The doctor was mystified and impressed by the brusque bitterness of +Lieutenant D'Hubert's tone. They left the house together, and in the +street he was still more mystified by his conduct. + +“Aren't you coming with me?” he asked. + +“No,” said Lieutenant D'Hubert. “You can find the house by yourself. The +front door will be open very likely.” + +“All right. Where's his room?” + +“Ground floor. But you had better go right through and look in the +garden first.” + +This astonishing piece of information made the surgeon go off without +further parley. Lieutenant D'Hubert regained his quarters nursing a hot +and uneasy indignation. He dreaded the chaff of his comrades almost +as much as the anger of his superiors. He felt as though he had been +entrapped into a damaging exposure. The truth was confoundedly grotesque +and embarrassing to justify; putting aside the irregularity of the +combat itself which made it come dangerously near a criminal offence. +Like all men without much imagination, which is such a help in the +processes of reflective thought, Lieutenant D'Hubert became frightfully +harassed by the obvious aspects of his predicament. He was certainly +glad that he had not killed Lieutenant Feraud outside all rules and +without the regular witnesses proper to such a transaction. Uncommonly +glad. At the same time he felt as though he would have liked to wring +his neck for him without ceremony. + +He was still under the sway of these contradictory sentiments when the +surgeon amateur of the flute came to see him. More than three days had +elapsed. Lieutenant D'Hubert was no longer _officier d'ordonnance_ +to the general commanding the division. He had been sent back to his +regiment. And he was resuming his connection with the soldiers' military +family, by being shut up in close confinement not at his own quarters +in town, but in a room in the barracks. Owing to the gravity of the +incident, he was allowed to see no one. He did not know what had +happened, what was being said or what was being thought. The arrival +of the surgeon was a most unexpected event to the worried captive. The +amateur of the flute began by explaining that he was there only by a +special favour of the colonel who had thought fit to relax the general +isolation order for this one occasion. + +“I represented to him that it would be only fair to give you authentic +news of your adversary,” he continued. “You'll be glad to hear he's +getting better fast.” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert's face exhibited no conventional signs of gladness. +He continued to walk the floor of the dusty bare room. + +“Take this chair, doctor,” he mumbled. + +The doctor sat down. + +“This affair is variously appreciated in town and in the army. In fact +the diversity of opinions is amusing.” + +“Is it?” mumbled Lieutenant D'Hubert, tramping steadily from wall to +wall. But within himself he marvelled that there could be two opinions +on the matter. The surgeon continued: + +“Of course as the real facts are not known--” + +“I should have thought,” interrupted D'Hubert, “that the fellow would +have put you in possession of the facts.” + +“He did say something,” admitted the other, “the first time I saw him. +And, by-the-bye, I did find him in the garden. The thump on the back of +his head had made him a little incoherent then. Afterwards he was rather +reticent than otherwise.” + +“Didn't think he would have the grace to be ashamed,” grunted D'Hubert, +who had stood still for a moment. He resumed his pacing while the doctor +murmured. + +“It's very amusing. Ashamed? Shame was not exactly his frame of mind. +However, you may look at the matter otherwise----” + +“What are you talking about? What matter?” asked D'Hubert with a +sidelong look at the heavy-faced, gray-haired figure seated on a wooden +chair. + +“Whatever it is,” said the surgeon, “I wouldn't pronounce an opinion on +your conduct....” + +“By heavens, you had better not,” burst out D'Hubert. + +“There! There! Don't be so quick in flourishing the sword. It doesn't +pay in the long run. Understand once for all that I would not carve any +of you youngsters except with the tools of my trade. But my advice is +good. Moderate your temper. If you go on like this you will make for +yourself an ugly reputation.” + +“Go on like what?” demanded Lieutenant D'Hubert, stopping short, +quite startled. “I! I! make for myself a reputation.... What do you +imagine----” + +“I told you I don't wish to judge of the rights and wrongs of this +incident. It's not my business. Nevertheless....” + +“What on earth has he been telling you?” interrupted Lieutenant D'Hubert +in a sort of awed scare. + +“I told, you already that at first when I picked him up in the garden +he was incoherent. Afterwards he was naturally reticent. But I gather at +least that he could not help himself....” + +“He couldn't?” shouted Lieutenant D'Hubert. Then lowering his voice, +“And what about me? Could I help myself?” + +The surgeon rose. His thoughts were running upon the flute, his constant +companion, with a consoling voice. In the vicinity of field ambulances, +after twenty-four hours' hard work, he had been known to trouble with +its sweet sounds the horrible stillness of battlefields given over +to silence and the dead. The solacing hour of his daily life was +approaching and in peace time he held on to the minutes as a miser to +his hoard. + +“Of course! Of course!” he said perfunctorily. “You would think so. It's +amusing. However, being perfectly neutral and friendly to you both, +I have consented to deliver his message. Say that I am humouring an +invalid if you like. He says that this affair is by no means at an +end. He intends to send you his seconds directly he has regained his +strength--providing, of course, the army is not in the field at that +time.” + +“He intends--does he? Why certainly,” spluttered Lieutenant D'Hubert +passionately. The secret of this exasperation was not apparent to the +visitor; but this passion confirmed him in the belief which was gaining +ground outside that some very serious difference had arisen between +these two young men. Something serious enough to wear an air of mystery. +Some fact of the utmost gravity. To settle their urgent difference +those two young men had risked being broken and disgraced at the outset, +almost, of their career. And he feared that the forthcoming inquiry +would fail to satisfy the public curiosity. They would not take the +public into their confidence as to that something which had passed +between them of a nature so outrageous as to make them face a charge of +murder--neither more nor less. But what could it be? + +The surgeon was not very curious by temperament; but that question, +haunting his mind, caused him twice that evening to hold the instrument +off his lips and sit silent for a whole minute--right in the middle of a +tune--trying to form a plausible conjecture. + + + + +II + +He succeeded in this object no better than the rest of the garrison and +the whole of society. The two young officers, of no especial consequence +till then, became distinguished by the universal curiosity as to the +origin of their quarrel. Madame de Lionne's salon was the centre of +ingenious surmises; that lady herself was for a time assailed with +inquiries as the last person known to have spoken to these unhappy and +reckless young men before they went out together from her house to +a savage encounter with swords, at dusk, in a private garden. She +protested she had noticed nothing unusual in their demeanour. Lieutenant +Feraud had been visibly annoyed at being called away. That was natural +enough; no man likes to be disturbed in a conversation with a lady +famed for her elegance and sensibility» But, in truth, the subject +bored Madame de Lionne since her personality could by no stretch of +imagination be connected with this affair. And it irritated her to hear +it advanced that there might have been some woman in the case. This +irritation arose, not from her elegance or sensibility, but from a more +instinctive side of her nature. It became so great at last that she +peremptorily forbade the subject to be mentioned under her roof. Near +her couch the prohibition was obeyed, but farther off in the salon +the pall of the imposed silence continued to be lifted more or less. A +diplomatic personage with a long pale face resembling the countenance +of a sheep, opined, shaking his head, that it was a quarrel of long +standing envenomed by time. It was objected to him that the men +themselves were too young for such a theory to fit their proceedings. +They belonged also to different and distant parts of France. A +subcommissary of the Intendence, an agreeable and cultivated bachelor +in keysermere breeches, Hessian boots and a blue coat embroidered with +silver lace, who affected to believe in the transmigration of souls, +suggested that the two had met perhaps in some previous existence. +The feud was in the forgotten past. It might have been something quite +inconceivable in the present state of their being; but their souls +remembered the animosity and manifested an instinctive antagonism. He +developed his theme jocularly. Yet the affair was so absurd from the +worldly, the military, the honourable, or the prudential point of view, +that this weird explanation seemed rather more reasonable than any +other. + +The two officers had confided nothing definite to any one. Resentment, +humiliation at having been worsted arms in hand, and an uneasy feeling +of having been involved into a scrape by the injustice of fate, kept +Lieutenant Feraud savagely dumb. He mistrusted the sympathy of mankind. +That would of course go to that dandified staff officer. Lying in bed he +raved to himself in his mind or aloud to the pretty maid who ministered +to his needs with devotion and listened to his horrible imprecations +with alarm. That Lieutenant D'Hubert should be made to “pay for it,” + whatever it was, seemed to her just and natural. Her principal concern +was that Lieutenant Feraud should not excite himself. He appeared so +wholly admirable and fascinating to the humility of her heart that her +only concern was to see him get well quickly even if it were only to +resume his visits to Madame de Lionne's salon. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert kept silent for the immediate reason that there was +no one except a stupid young soldier servant to speak to. But he was not +anxious for the opportunities of which his severe arrest deprived him. +He would have been uncommunicative from dread of ridicule. He was aware +that the episode, so grave professionally, had its comic side. When +reflecting upon it he still felt that he would like to wring Lieutenant +Feraud's neck for him. But this formula was figurative rather than +precise, and expressed more a state of mind than an actual physical +impulse. At the same time there was in that young man a feeling of +comradeship and kindness which made him unwilling to make the position +of Lieutenant Feraud worse than it was. + +He did not want to talk at large about this wretched affair. At the +inquiry he would have, of course, to speak the truth in self-defence. +This prospect vexed him. + +But no inquiry took place. The army took the field instead. Lieutenant +D'Hubert, liberated without remark, returned to his regimental duties, +and Lieutenant Feraud, his arm still in a sling, rode unquestioned with +his squadron to complete his convalescence in the smoke of battlefields +and the fresh air of night bivouacs. This bracing treatment suited his +case so well that at the first rumour of an armistice being signed he +could turn without misgivings to the prosecution of his private warfare. + +This time it was to be regular warfare. He dispatched two friends to +Lieutenant D'Hubert, whose regiment was stationed only a few miles away. +Those friends had asked no questions of their principal. “I must pay him +off, that pretty staff officer,” he had said grimly, and they went +away quite contentedly on their mission. Lieutenant D'Hubert had no +difficulty in finding two friends equally discreet and devoted to their +principal. “There's a sort of crazy fellow to whom I must give another +lesson,” he had curtly declared, and they asked for no better reasons. + +On these grounds an encounter with duelling swords was arranged one +early morning in a convenient field. At the third set-to, Lieutenant +D'Hubert found himself lying on his back on the dewy grass, with a hole +in his side. A serene sun, rising over a German landscape of meadows +and wooded hills, hung on his left. A surgeon--not the flute-player but +another--was bending over him, feeling around the wound. + +“Narrow squeak. But it will be nothing,” he pronounced. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert heard these words with pleasure. One of his +seconds--the one who, sitting on the wet grass, was sustaining his head +on his lap-said: + +“The fortune of war, _mon pauvre vieux_. What will you have? You had +better make it up, like two good fellows. Do!” + +“You don't know what you ask,” murmured Lieutenant D'Hubert in a feeble +voice. “However, if he...” + +In another part of the meadow the seconds of Lieutenant Feraud were +urging him to go over and shake hands with his adversary. + +“You have paid him off now--_que diable_. It's the proper thing to do. +This D'Hubert is a decent fellow.” + +“I know the decency of these generals' pets,” muttered Lieutenant Feraud +through his teeth for all answer. The sombre expression of his face +discouraged further efforts at reconciliation. The seconds, bowing from +a distance, took their men off the field. In the afternoon, Lieutenant +D'Hubert, very popular as a good comrade uniting great bravery with +a frank and equable temper, had many visitors. It was remarked that +Lieutenant Feraud did not, as customary, show himself much abroad to +receive the felicitations of his friends. They would not have failed +him, because he, too, was liked for the exuberance of his southern +nature and the simplicity of his character. In all the places where +officers were in the habit of assembling at the end of the day the +duel of the morning was talked over from every point of view. Though +Lieutenant D'Hubert had got worsted this time, his sword-play was +commended. No one could deny that it was very close, very scientific. +If he got touched, some said, it was because he wished to spare his +adversary. But by many the vigour and dash of Lieutenant Feraud's attack +were pronounced irresistible. + +The merits of the two officers as combatants were frankly discussed; but +their attitude to each other after the duel was criticised lightly and +with caution. It was irreconcilable, and that was to be regretted. After +all, they knew best what the care of their honour dictated. It was not a +matter for their comrades to pry into overmuch. As to the origin of the +quarrel, the general impression was that it dated from the time they +were holding garrison in Strasburg. Only the musical surgeon shook his +head at that. It went much farther back, he hinted discreetly. + +“Why! You must know the whole story,” cried several voices, eager with +curiosity. “You were there! What was it?” + +He raised his eyes from his glass deliberately and said: + +“Even if I knew ever so well, you can't expect me to tell you, since +both the principals choose to say nothing.” + +He got up and went out, leaving the sense of mystery behind him. He +could not stay longer because the witching hour of flute-playing was +drawing near. After he had gone a very young officer observed solemnly: + +“Obviously! His lips are sealed.” + +Nobody questioned the high propriety of that remark. Somehow it added +to the impressiveness of the affair. Several older officers of both +regiments, prompted by nothing but sheer kindness and love of harmony, +proposed to form a Court of Honour to which the two officers would +leave the task of their reconciliation. Unfortunately, they began by +approaching Lieutenant Feraud. The assumption was, that having just +scored heavily, he would be found placable and disposed to moderation. + +The reasoning was sound enough; nevertheless, the move turned out +unfortunate. In that relaxation of moral fibre which is brought about +by the ease of soothed vanity, Lieutenant Feraud had condescended in +the secret of his heart to review the case, and even to doubt not the +justice of his cause, but the absolute sagacity of his conduct. This +being so, he was disinclined to talk about it. The suggestion of the +regimental wise men put him in a difficult position. He was disgusted, +and this disgust by a sort of paradoxical logic reawakened his animosity +against Lieutenant D'Hubert. Was he to be pestered with this fellow +for ever--the fellow who had an infernal knack of getting round people +somehow? On the other hand, it was difficult to refuse point-blank that +sort of mediation sanctioned by the code of honour. + +Lieutenant Feraud met the difficulty by an attitude of fierce reserve. +He twisted his moustache and used vague words. His case was perfectly +clear. He was not ashamed to present it, neither was he afraid to defend +it personally. He did not see any reason to jump at the suggestion +before ascertaining how his adversary was likely to take it. + +Later in the day, his exasperation growing upon him, he was heard in +a public place saying sardonically “that it would be the very luckiest +thing for Lieutenant D'Hubert, since next time of meeting he need not +hope to get off with a mere trifle of three weeks in bed.” + +This boastful phrase might have been prompted by the most profound +Machiavelism. Southern natures often hide under the outward +impulsiveness of action and speech a certain amount of astuteness. + +Lieutenant Feraud, mistrusting the justice of men, by no means desired +a Court of Honour. And these words, according so well with his +temperament, had also the merit of serving his turn. Whether meant for +that purpose or not, they found their way in less than four-and-twenty +hours into Lieutenant D'Hubert's bedroom. In consequence, Lieutenant +D'Hubert, sitting propped up with pillows, received the overtures made +to him next day by the statement that the affair was of a nature which +could not bear discussion. + +The pale face of the wounded officer, his weak voice which he had yet +to use cautiously, and the courteous dignity of his tone, had a great +effect on his hearers. Reported outside, all this did more for deepening +the mystery than the vapourings of Lieutenant Feraud. This last was +greatly relieved at the issue. He began to enjoy the state of general +wonder, and was pleased to add to it by assuming an attitude of moody +reserve. + +The colonel of Lieutenant D'Hubert's regiment was a gray-haired, +weather-beaten warrior who took a simple view of his responsibilities. +“I can't”--he thought to himself--“let the best of my subalterns get +damaged like this for nothing. I must get to the bottom of this affair +privately. He must speak out, if the devil were in it. The colonel +should be more than a father to these youngsters.” And, indeed, he loved +all his men with as much affection as a father of a large family can +feel for every individual member of it. If human beings by an oversight +of Providence came into the world in the state of civilians, they were +born again into a regiment as infants are born into a family, and it was +that military birth alone which really counted. + +At the sight of Lieutenant D'Hubert standing before him bleached and +hollow-eyed, the heart of the old warrior was touched with genuine +compassion. All his affection for the regiment--that body of men which +he held in his hand to launch forward and draw back, who had given him +his rank, ministered to his pride and commanded his thoughts--seemed +centred for a moment on the person of the most promising subaltern. He +cleared his throat in a threatening manner and frowned terribly. + +“You must understand,” he began, “that I don't care a rap for the life +of a single man in the regiment. You know that I would send the 748 +of you men and horses galloping into the pit of perdition with no more +compunction than I would kill a fly.” + +“Yes, colonel. You would be riding at our head,” said Lieutenant +D'Hubert with a wan smile. + +The colonel, who felt the need of being very diplomatic, fairly roared +at this. + +“I want you to know, Lieutenant D'Hubert, that I could stand aside and +see you all riding to Hades, if need be. I am a man to do even that, if +the good of the service and my duty to my country required it from me. +But that's unthinkable, so don't you even hint at such a thing.” + +He glared awfully, but his voice became gentle. “There's some milk yet +about that moustache of yours, my boy. You don't know what a man like +me is capable of. I would hide behind a haystack if... Don't grin at me, +sir. How dare you? If this were not a private conversation, I would... +Look here. I am responsible for the proper expenditure of lives under my +command for the glory of our country and the honour of the regiment. Do +you understand that? Well, then, what the devil do you mean by letting +yourself be spitted like this by that fellow of the Seventh Hussars? +It's simply disgraceful!” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert, who expected another sort of conclusion, felt vexed +beyond measure. His shoulders moved slightly. He made no other answer. +He could not ignore his responsibility. The colonel softened his glance +and lowered his voice. + +“It's deplorable,” he murmured. And again he changed his tone. “Come,” + he went on persuasively, but with that note of authority which dwells +in the throat of a good leader of men, “this affair must be settled. I +desire to be told plainly what it is all about. I demand, as your best +friend, to know.” + +The compelling power of authority, the softening influence of the +kindness affected deeply a man just risen from a bed of sickness. +Lieutenant D'Hubert's hand, which grasped the knob of a stick, trembled +slightly. But his northern temperament, sentimental but cautious and +clear-sighted, too, in its idealistic way, predominated over his impulse +to make a clean breast of the whole deadly absurdity. According to the +precept of transcendental wisdom, he turned his tongue seven times in +his mouth before he spoke. He made then only a speech of thanks, nothing +more. The colonel listened interested at first, then looked mystified. +At last he frowned. + +“You hesitate--_mille tonerres!_ Haven't I told you that I will +condescend to argue with you--as a friend?” + +“Yes, colonel,” answered Lieutenant D'Hubert softly, “but I am afraid +that after you have heard me out as a friend, you will take action as my +superior officer.” + +The attentive colonel snapped his jaws. + +“Well, what of that?” he said frankly. “Is it so damnably disgraceful?” + +“It is not,” negatived Lieutenant D'Hubert in a faint but resolute +voice. + +“Of course I shall act for the good of the service--nothing can prevent +me doing that. What do you think I want to be told for?” + +“I know it is not from idle curiosity,” tested Lieutenant D'Hubert. “I +know you will act wisely. But what about the good fame of the regiment?” + +“It cannot be affected by any youthful folly of a lieutenant,” the +colonel said severely. + +“No, it cannot be; but it can be by evil tongues. It will be said that +a lieutenant of the Fourth Hussars, afraid of meeting his adversary, is +hiding behind his colonel. And that would be worse than hiding behind +a haystack--for the good of the service. I cannot afford to do that, +colonel.” + +“Nobody would dare to say anything of the kind,” the colonel, beginning +very fiercely, ended on an uncertain note. The bravery of Lieutenant +D'Hubert was well known; but the colonel was well aware that the +duelling courage, the single combat courage, is, rightly or wrongly, +supposed to be courage of a special sort; and it was eminently +necessary that an officer of his regiment should possess every kind +of courage--and prove it, too. The colonel stuck out his lower lip and +looked far away with a peculiar glazed stare. This was the expression of +his perplexity, an expression practically unknown to his regiment, for +perplexity is a sentiment which is incompatible with the rank of colonel +of cavalry. The colonel himself was overcome by the unpleasant +novelty of the sensation. As he was not accustomed to think except on +professional matters connected with the welfare of men and horses and +the proper use thereof on the field of glory, his intellectual efforts +degenerated into mere mental repetitions of profane language. “_Mille +tonerres!... Sacré nom de nom..._” he thought. + +Lieutenant D'Hubert coughed painfully and went on, in a weary voice: + +“There will be plenty of evil tongues to say that I've been cowed. And +I am sure you will not expect me to pass that sort of thing over. I may +find myself suddenly with a dozen duels on my hands instead of this one +affair.” + +The direct simplicity of this argument came home to the colonel's +understanding. He looked at his subordinate fixedly. + +“Sit down, lieutenant,” he said gruffly. “This is the very devil of a... +sit down.” + +“_Mon colonel_” D'Hubert began again. “I am not afraid of evil tongues. +There's a way of silencing them. But there's my peace of mind too. I +wouldn't be able to shake off the notion that I've ruined a brother +officer. Whatever action you take it is bound to go further. The +inquiry has been dropped--let it rest now. It would have been the end of +Feraud.” + +“Hey? What? Did he behave so badly?” + +“Yes, it was pretty bad,” muttered Lieutenant D'Hubert. Being still very +weak, he felt a disposition to cry. + +As the other man did not belong to his own regiment the colonel had no +difficulty in believing this. He began to pace up and down the room. +He was a good chief and a man capable of discreet sympathy. But he was +human in other ways, too, and they were apparent because he was not +capable of artifice. + +“The very devil, lieutenant!” he blurted out in the innocence of his +heart, “is that I have declared my intention to get to the bottom of +this affair. And when a colonel says something... you see...” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert broke in earnestly. + +“Let me entreat you, colonel, to be satisfied with taking my word of +honour that I was put into a damnable position where I had no option. +I had no choice whatever consistent with my dignity as a man and an +officer.... After all, colonel, this fact is the very bottom of this +affair. Here you've got it. The rest is a mere detail....” + +The colonel stopped short. The reputation of Lieutenant D'Hubert for +good sense and good temper weighed in the balance. A cool head, a warm +heart, open as the day. Always correct in his behaviour. One had to +trust him. The colonel repressed manfully an immense curiosity. + +“H'm! You affirm that as a man and an officer.... No option? Eh?” + +“As an officer, an officer of the Fourth Hussars, too,” repeated +Lieutenant D'Hubert, “I had not. And that is the bottom of the affair, +colonel.” + +“Yes. But still I don't see why to one's colonel... A colonel is a +father--_que diable_.” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert ought not to have been allowed out as yet. He +was becoming aware of his physical insufficiency with humiliation and +despair--but the morbid obstinacy of an invalid possessed him--and at +the same time he felt, with dismay, his eyes filling with water. This +trouble seemed too big to handle. A tear fell down the thin, pale cheek +of Lieutenant D'Hubert. The colonel turned his back on him hastily. You +could have heard a pin drop. + +“This is some silly woman story--is it not?” + +The chief spun round to seize the truth, which is not a beautiful shape +living in a well but a shy bird best caught by stratagem. This was +the last move of the colonel's diplomacy, and he saw the truth shining +unmistakably in the gesture of Lieutenant D'Hubert, raising his weak +arms and his eyes to heaven in supreme protest. + +“Not a woman affair--eh?” growled the colonel, staring hard. “I don't +ask you who or where. All I want to know is whether there is a woman in +it?” + +Lieutenant D'Hubert's arms dropped and his weak voice was pathetically +broken. + +“Nothing of the kind, mon colonel.” + +“On your honour?” insisted the old warrior. + +“On my honour.” + +“Very well,” said the colonel thoughtfully, and bit his lip. The +arguments of Lieutenant D'Hubert, helped by his liking for the person, +had convinced him. Yet it was highly improper that his intervention, of +which he had made no secret, should produce no visible effect. He kept +Lieutenant D'Hubert a little longer and dismissed him kindly. + +“Take a few days more in bed, lieutenant. What the devil does the +surgeon mean by reporting you fit for duty?” + +On coming out of the colonel's quarters, Lieutenant D'Hubert said +nothing to the friend who was waiting outside to take him home. He said +nothing to anybody. Lieutenant D'Hubert made no confidences. But in the +evening of that day the colonel, strolling under the elms growing near +his quarters in the company of his second in command opened his lips. + +“I've got to the bottom of this affair,” he remarked. + +The lieutenant-colonel, a dry brown chip of a man with short +side-whiskers, pricked up his ears without letting a sound of curiosity +escape him. + +“It's no trifle,” added the colonel oracularly. The other waited for a +long while before he murmured: + +“Indeed, sir!” + +“No trifle,” repeated the colonel, looking straight before him. “I've, +however, forbidden D'Hubert either to send to or receive a challenge +from Feraud for the next twelve months.” + +He had imagined this prohibition to save the prestige a colonel should +have. The result of it was to give an official seal to the mystery +surrounding this deadly quarrel. Lieutenant D'Hubert repelled by an +impassive silence all attempts to worm the truth out of him. Lieutenant +Feraud, secretly uneasy at first, regained his assurance as time went +on. He disguised his ignorance of the meaning of the imposed truce by +little sardonic laughs as though he were amused by what he intended to +keep to himself. “But what will you do?” his chums used to ask him. He +contented himself by replying, “_Qui vivra verra_,” with a truculent +air. And everybody admired his discretion. + +Before the end of the truce, Lieutenant D'Hubert got his promotion. It +was well earned, but somehow no one seemed to expect the event. When +Lieutenant Feraud heard of it at a gathering of officers, he muttered +through his teeth, “Is that so?” Unhooking his sword from a peg near the +door, he buckled it on carefully and left the company without another +word. He walked home with measured steps, struck a light with his flint +and steel, and lit his tallow candle. Then, snatching an unlucky glass +tumbler off the mantelpiece, he dashed it violently on the floor. + +Now that D'Hubert was an officer of a rank superior to his own, there +could be no question of a duel. Neither could send nor receive a +challenge without rendering himself amenable to a court-martial. It +was not to be thought of. Lieutenant Feraud, who for many days now had +experienced no real desire to meet Lieutenant D'Hubert arms in hand, +chafed at the systematic injustice of fate. “Does he think he will +escape me in that way?” he thought indignantly. He saw in it an +intrigue, a conspiracy, a cowardly manoeuvre. That colonel knew what he +was doing. He had hastened to recommend his pet for promotion. It was +outrageous that a man should be able to avoid the consequences of his +acts in such a dark and tortuous manner. + +Of a happy-go-lucky disposition, of a temperament more pugnacious than +military, Lieutenant Feraud had been content to give and receive blows +for sheer love of armed strife and without much thought of advancement. +But after this disgusting experience an urgent desire of promotion +sprang up in his breast. This fighter by vocation resolved in his mind +to seize showy occasions and to court the favourable opinion of his +chiefs like a mere worldling. He knew he was as brave as any one +and never doubted his personal charm. It would be easy, he thought. +Nevertheless, neither the bravery nor the charm seemed to work very +swiftly. Lieutenant Feraud's engaging, careless truculence of a “_beau +sabreur_” underwent a change. He began to make bitter allusions to +“clever fellows who stick at nothing to get on.” The army was full of +them, he would say, you had only to look round. And all the time he had +in view one person only, his adversary D'Hubert. Once he confided to an +appreciative friend: “You see I don't know how to fawn on the right sort +of people. It isn't in me.” + +He did not get his step till a week after Austerlitz. The light cavalry +of the _Grande Armée_ had its hands very full of interesting work for a +little while. But directly the pressure of professional occupation had +been eased by the armistice, Captain Feraud took measures to arrange a +meeting without loss of time. “I know his tricks,” he observed grimly. +“If I don't look sharp he will take care to get himself promoted over +the heads of a dozen better men than himself. He's got the knack of that +sort of thing.” This duel was fought in Silesia. If not fought out to +a finish, it was at any rate fought to a standstill. The weapon was +the cavalry sabre, and the skill, the science, the vigour, and the +determination displayed by the adversaries compelled the outspoken +admiration of the beholders. It became the subject of talk on both +shores of the Danube, and as far south as the garrisons of Gratz +and Laybach. They crossed blades seven times. Both had many slight +cuts--mere scratches which bled profusely. Both refused to have the +combat stopped, time after time, with what appeared the most deadly +animosity. This appearance was caused on the part of Captain D'Hubert by +a rational desire to be done once for all with this worry; on the part +of Feraud by a tremendous exaltation of his pugnacious instincts and +the rage of wounded vanity. At last, dishevelled, their shirts in rags, +covered with gore and hardly able to stand, they were carried forcibly +off the field by their marvelling and horrified seconds. Later on, +besieged by comrades avid of details, these gentlemen declared that they +could not have allowed that sort of hacking to go on. Asked whether the +quarrel was settled this time, they gave it out as their conviction that +it was a difference which could only be settled by one of the parties +remaining lifeless on the ground. The sensation spread from army to army +corps, and penetrated at last to the smallest detachments of the troops +cantoned between the Rhine and the Save. In the cafés in Vienna where +the masters of Europe took their ease it was generally estimated from +details to hand that the adversaries would be able to meet again in +three weeks' time, on the outside. Something really transcendental in +the way of duelling was expected. + +These expectations were brought to naught by the necessities of the +service which separated the two officers. No official notice had been +taken of their quarrel. It was now the property of the army, and not +to be meddled with lightly. But the story of the duel, or rather their +duelling propensities, must have stood somewhat in the way of their +advancement, because they were still captains when they came together +again during the war with Prussia. Detached north after Jena with +the army commanded by Marshal Bernadotte, Prince of Ponte-Corvo, they +entered Lubeck together. It was only after the occupation of that town +that Captain Feraud had leisure to consider his future conduct in view +of the fact that Captain D'Hubert had been given the position of third +aide-de-camp to the marshal. He considered it a great part of a night, +and in the morning summoned two sympathetic friends. + +“I've been thinking it over calmly,” he said, gazing at them with +bloodshot, tired eyes. “I see that I must get rid of that intriguing +personage. Here he's managed to sneak onto the personal staff of the +marshal. It's a direct provocation to me. I can't tolerate a situation +in which I am exposed any day to receive an order through him, and God +knows what order, too! That sort of thing has happened once before--and +that's once too often. He understands this perfectly, never fear. I +can't tell you more than this. Now go. You know what it is you have to +do.” + +This encounter took place outside the town of Lubeck, on very open +ground selected with special care in deference to the general sense of +the cavalry division belonging to the army corps, that this time the two +officers should meet on horseback. After all, this duel was a cavalry +affair, and to persist in fighting on foot would look like a slight +on one's own arm of the service. The seconds, startled by the unusual +nature of the suggestion, hastened to refer to their principals. Captain +Feraud jumped at it with savage alacrity. For some obscure reason, +depending, no doubt, on his psychology, he imagined himself invincible +on horseback. All alone within the four walls of his room he rubbed his +hands exultingly. “Aha! my staff officer, I've got you now!” + +Captain D'Hubert, on his side, after staring hard for a considerable +time at his bothered seconds, shrugged his shoulders slightly. This +affair had hopelessly and unreasonably complicated his existence for +him. One absurdity more or less in the development did not matter. All +absurdity was distasteful to him; but, urbane as ever, he produced a +faintly ironic smile and said in his calm voice: + +“It certainly will do away to some extent with the monotony of the +thing.” + +But, left to himself, he sat down at a table and took his head into +his hands. He had not spared himself of late, and the marshal had been +working his aides-de-camp particularly hard. The last three weeks of +campaigning in horrible weather had affected his health. When overtired +he suffered from a stitch in his wounded side, and that uncomfortable +sensation always depressed him. “It's that brute's doing,” he thought +bitterly. + +The day before he had received a letter from home, announcing that his +only sister was going to be married. He reflected that from the time she +was sixteen, when he went away to garrison life in Strasburg, he had +had but two short glimpses of her. They had been great friends and +confidants; and now they were going to give her away to a man whom he +did not know--a very worthy fellow, no doubt, but not half good enough +for her. He would never see his old Léonie again. She had a capable +little head and plenty of tact; she would know how to manage the fellow, +to be sure. He was easy about her happiness, but he felt ousted from +the first place in her affection which had been his ever since the +girl could speak. And a melancholy regret of the days of his childhood +settled upon Captain D'Hubert, third aide-de-camp to the Prince of +Ponte-Corvo. + +He pushed aside the letter of congratulation he had begun to write, as +in duty bound but without pleasure. He took a fresh sheet of paper +and wrote: “This is my last will and testament.” And, looking at these +words, he gave himself up to unpleasant reflection; a presentiment +that he would never see the scenes of his childhood overcame Captain +D'Hubert. He jumped up, pushing his chair back, yawned leisurely, which +demonstrated to himself that he didn't care anything for presentiments, +and, throwing himself on the bed, went to sleep. During the night he +shivered from time to time without waking up. In the morning he rode +out of town between his two seconds, talking of indifferent things and +looking right and left with apparent detachment into the heavy morning +mists, shrouding the flat green fields bordered by hedges. He leaped a +ditch, and saw the forms of many mounted men moving in the low fog. “We +are to fight before a gallery,” he muttered bitterly. + +His seconds were rather concerned at the state of the atmosphere, +but presently a pale and sympathetic sun struggled above the vapours. +Captain D'Hubert made out in the distance three horsemen riding a little +apart; it was his adversary and his seconds. He drew his sabre and +assured himself that it was properly fastened to his wrist. And now the +seconds, who had been standing in a close group with the heads of their +horses together, separated at an easy canter, leaving a large, clear +field between him and his adversary. Captain D'Hubert looked at the pale +sun, at the dismal landscape, and the imbecility of the impending +fight filled him with desolation. From a distant part of the field +a stentorian voice shouted commands at proper intervals: _Au pas--Au +trot--Chargez!_ Presentiments of death don't come to a man for nothing +he thought at the moment he put spurs to his horse. + +And therefore nobody was more surprised than himself when, at the very +first set-to, Captain Feraud laid himself open to a cut extending over +the forehead, blinding him with blood, and ending the combat almost +before it had fairly begun. The surprise of Captain Feraud might have +been even greater. Captain D'Hubert, leaving him swearing horribly and +reeling in the saddle between his two appalled friends, leaped the ditch +again and trotted home with his two seconds, who seemed rather awestruck +at the speedy issue of that encounter. In the evening, Captain D'Hubert +finished the congratulatory letter on his sister's marriage. + +He finished it late. It was a long letter. Captain D'Hubert gave reins +to his fancy. He told his sister he would feel rather lonely after this +great change in her life. But, he continued, “the day will come for me, +too, to get married. In fact, I am thinking already of the time when +there will be no one left to fight in Europe, and the epoch of wars +will be over. I shall expect then to be within measurable distance of a +marshal's baton and you will be an experienced married woman. You shall +look out a nice wife for me. I will be moderately bald by then, and a +little blasé; I will require a young girl--pretty, of course, and with +a large fortune, you know, to help me close my glorious career with the +splendour befitting my exalted rank.” He ended with the information +that he had just given a lesson to a worrying, quarrelsome fellow, who +imagined he had a grievance against him. “But if you, in the depth of +your province,” he continued, “ever hear it said that your brother is of +a quarrelsome disposition, don't you believe it on any account. There +is no saying what gossip from the army may reach your innocent ears; +whatever you hear, you may assure our father that your ever loving +brother is not a duellist.” Then Captain D'Hubert crumpled up the sheet +of paper with the words, “This is my last will and testament,” and threw +it in the fire with a great laugh at himself. He didn't care a snap +for what that lunatic fellow could do. He had suddenly acquired the +conviction that this man was utterly powerless to affect his life in any +sort of way, except, perhaps, in the way of putting a certain special +excitement into the delightful gay intervals between the campaigns. + +From this on there were, however, to be no peaceful intervals in the +career of Captain D'Hubert. He saw the fields of Eylau and Friedland, +marched and countermarched in the snow, the mud, and the dust of Polish +plains, picking up distinction and advancement on all the roads of +northeastern Europe. Meantime, Captain Feraud, despatched southward with +his regiment, made unsatisfactory war in Spain. It was only when the +preparations for the Russian campaign began that he was ordered north +again. He left the country of mantillas and oranges without regret. + +The first signs of a not unbecoming baldness added to the lofty aspect +of Colonel D'Hubert's forehead. This feature was no longer white and +smooth as in the days of his youth, and the kindly open glance of his +blue eyes had grown a little hard, as if from much peering through the +smoke of battles. The ebony crop on Colonel Feraud's head, coarse and +crinkly like a cap of horsehair, showed many silver threads about the +temples. A detestable warfare of ambushes and inglorious surprises had +not improved his temper. The beaklike curve of his nose was unpleasantly +set off by deep folds on each side of his mouth. The round orbits of his +eyes radiated fine wrinkles. More than ever he recalled an irritable +and staring fowl--something like a cross between a parrot and an owl. +He still manifested an outspoken dislike for “intriguing fellows.” He +seized every opportunity to state that he did not pick up his rank in +the anterooms of marshals. + +The unlucky persons, civil or military, who, with an intention of being +pleasant, begged Colonel Feraud to tell them how he came by that very +apparent scar on the forehead, were astonished to find themselves +snubbed in various ways, some of which were simply rude and others +mysteriously sardonic. Young officers were warned kindly by their more +experienced comrades not to stare openly at the colonel's scar. But, +indeed, an officer need have been very young in his profession not +to have heard the legendary tale of that duel originating in some +mysterious, unforgivable offence. + + + + +III + +The retreat from Moscow submerged all private feelings in a sea of +disaster and misery. Colonels without regiments, D'Hubert and Feraud +carried the musket in the ranks of the sacred battalion--a battalion +recruited from officers of all arms who had no longer any troops to +lead. + +In that battalion promoted colonels did duty as sergeants; the generals +captained the companies; a marshal of France, Prince of the Empire, +commanded the whole. All had provided themselves with muskets picked +up on the road, and cartridges taken from the dead. In the general +destruction of the bonds of discipline and duty holding together the +companies, the battalions, the regiments, the brigades and divisions +of an armed host, this body of men put their pride in preserving some +semblance of order and formation. The only stragglers were those who +fell out to give up to the frost their exhausted souls. They plodded on +doggedly, stumbling over the corpses of men, the carcasses of horses, +the fragments of gun-carriages, covered by the white winding-sheet of +the great disaster. Their passage did not disturb the mortal silence of +the plains, shining with a livid light under a sky the colour of ashes. +Whirlwinds of snow ran along the fields, broke against the dark column, +rose in a turmoil of flying icicles, and subsided, disclosing it +creeping on without the swing and rhythm of the military pace. They +struggled onward, exchanging neither words nor looks--whole ranks +marched, touching elbows, day after day, and never raising their eyes, +as if lost in despairing reflections. On calm days, in the dumb black +forests of pines the cracking of overloaded branches was the only sound. +Often from daybreak to dusk no one spoke in the whole column. It was +like a _macabre_ march of struggling corpses towards a distant grave. +Only an alarm of Cossacks could restore to their lack-lustre eyes a +semblance of martial resolution. The battalion deployed, facing about, +or formed square under the endless fluttering of snowflakes. A cloud of +horsemen with fur caps on their heads, levelled long lances and yelled +“Hurrah! Hurrah!” around their menacing immobility, whence, with muffled +detonations, hundreds of dark-red flames darted through the air thick +with falling snow. In a very few moments the horsemen would disappear, +as if carried off yelling in the gale, and the battalion, standing +still, alone in the blizzard, heard only the wind searching their very +hearts. Then, with a cry or two of “_Vive l'Empereur!_” it would resume +its march, leaving behind a few lifeless bodies lying huddled up, tiny +dark specks on the white ground. + +Though often marching in the ranks or skirmishing in the woods side +by side, the two officers ignored each other; this not so much from +inimical intention as from a very real indifference. All their store of +moral energy was expended in resisting the terrific enmity of Nature and +the crushing sense of irretrievable disaster. + +Neither of them allowed himself to be crushed. To the last they counted +among the most active, the least demoralised of the battalion; their +vigorous vitality invested them both with the appearance of an heroic +pair in the eyes of their comrades. And they never exchanged more than +a casual word or two, except one day when, skirmishing in front of the +battalion against a worrying attack of cavalry, they found themselves +cut off by a small party of Cossacks. A score of wild-looking, hairy +horsemen rode to and fro, brandishing their lances in ominous silence. +The two officers had no mind to lay down their arms, and Colonel Feraud +suddenly spoke up in a hoarse, growling voice, bringing his firelock to +the shoulder: + +“You take the nearest brute, Colonel D'Hubert; I'll settle the next one. +I am a better shot than you are.” + +Colonel D'Hubert only nodded over his levelled musket. Their shoulders +were pressed against the trunk of a large tree; in front, deep +snowdrifts protected them from a direct charge. + +[Illustration: 088.jpg “You take the nearest brute, Colonel D'Hubert”] + +Two carefully aimed shots rang out in the frosty air, two Cossacks +reeled in their saddles. The rest, not thinking the game good enough, +closed round their wounded comrades and galloped away out of range. The +two officers managed to rejoin their battalion, halted for the night. +During that afternoon they had leaned upon each other more than once, +and towards the last Colonel D'Hubert, whose long legs gave him an +advantage in walking through soft snow, peremptorily took the musket +from Colonel Feraud and carried it on his shoulder, using his own as a +staff. + +On the outskirts of a village, half-buried in the snow, an old wooden +barn burned with a clear and immense flame. The sacred battalion of +skeletons muffled in rags crowded greedily the windward side, stretching +hundreds of numbed, bony hands to the blaze. Nobody had noted their +approach. Before entering the circle of light playing on the multitude +of sunken, glassy-eyed, starved faces, Colonel D'Hubert spoke in his +turn: + +“Here's your firelock, Colonel Feraud. I can walk better than you.” + +Colonel Feraud nodded, and pushed on towards the warmth of the fierce +flames. Colonel D'Hubert was more deliberate, but not the less bent +on getting a place in the front rank. Those they pushed aside tried +to greet with a faint cheer the reappearance of the two indomitable +companions in activity and endurance. Those manly qualities had never, +perhaps, received a higher tribute than this feeble acclamation. + +This is the faithful record of speeches exchanged during the retreat +from Moscow by Colonels Feraud and D'Hubert. Colonel Feraud's +taciturnity was the outcome of concentrated rage. Short, hairy, +black-faced with layers of grime, and a thick sprouting of a wiry beard, +a frost-bitten hand, wrapped in filthy rags, carried in a sling, he +accused fate bitterly of unparalleled perfidy towards the sublime Man of +Destiny. Colonel D'Hubert, his long moustache pendent in icicles on each +side of his cracked blue lips, his eyelids inflamed with the glare of +snows, the principal part of his costume consisting of a sheepskin coat +looted with difficulty from the frozen corpse of a camp follower +found in an abandoned cart, took a more thoughtful view of events. His +regularly handsome features now reduced to mere bony fines and fleshless +hollows, looked out of a woman's black velvet hood, over which was +rammed forcibly a cocked hat picked up under the wheels of an empty army +fourgon which must have contained at one time some general officer's +luggage. The sheepskin coat being short for a man of his inches, ended +very high up his elegant person, and the skin of his legs, blue with the +cold, showed through the tatters of his nether garments. This, under +the circumstances, provoked neither jeers nor pity. No one cared how the +next man felt or looked. Colonel D'Hubert himself hardened to exposure, +suffered mainly in his self-respect from the lamentable indecency of +his costume. A thoughtless person may think that with a whole host of +inanimate bodies bestrewing the path of retreat there could not have +been much difficulty in supplying the deficiency. But the great majority +of these bodies lay buried under the falls of snow, others had been +already despoiled; and besides, to loot a pair of breeches from a frozen +corpse is not so easy as it may appear to a mere theorist. It requires +time. You must remain behind while your companions march on. And Colonel +D'Hubert had his scruples as to falling out. They arose from a point of +honour, and also a little from dread. Once he stepped aside he could not +be sure of ever rejoining his battalion. And the enterprise demanded a +physical effort from which his starved body shrank. The ghastly intimacy +of a wrestling match with the frozen dead opposing the unyielding +rigidity of iron to your violence was repugnant to the inborn delicacy +of his feelings. + +Luckily, one day grubbing in a mound of snow between the huts of a +village in the hope of finding there a frozen potato or some vegetable +garbage he could put between his long and shaky teeth, Colonel D'Hubert +uncovered a couple of mats of the sort Russian peasants use to line the +sides of their carts. These, shaken free of frozen snow, bent about his +person and fastened solidly round his waist, made a bell-shaped nether +garment, a sort of stiff petticoat, rendering Colonel D'Hubert a +perfectly decent but a much more noticeable figure than before. + +Thus accoutred he continued to retreat, never doubting of his personal +escape but full of other misgivings. The early buoyancy of his belief +in the future was destroyed. If the road of glory led through such +unforeseen passages--he asked himself, for he was reflective, whether +the guide was altogether trustworthy. And a patriotic sadness not +unmingled with some personal concern, altogether unlike the unreasoning +indignation against men and things nursed by Colonel Feraud, oppressed +the equable spirits of Colonel D'Hubert. Recruiting his strength in a +little German town for three weeks, he was surprised to discover within +himself a love of repose. His returning vigour was strangely pacific in +its aspirations. He meditated silently upon that bizarre change of +mood. No doubt many of his brother officers of field rank had the same +personal experience. But these were not the times to talk of it. In one +of his letters home Colonel D'Hubert wrote: “All your plans, my dear +Leonie, of marrying me to the charming girl you have discovered in your +neighbourhood, seem farther off than ever. Peace is not yet. Europe +wants another lesson. It will be a hard task for us, but it will be done +well, because the emperor is invincible.” + +Thus wrote Colonel D'Hubert from Pomerania to his married sister Léonie, +settled in the south of France. And so far the sentiments expressed +would not have been disowned by Colonel Feraud who wrote no letters to +anybody; whose father had been in life an illiterate blacksmith; who had +no sister or brother, and whom no one desired ardently to pair off for a +life of peace with a charming young girl. But Colonel D'Hubert's letter +contained also some philosophical generalities upon the uncertainty of +all personal hopes if bound up entirely with the prestigious fortune of +one incomparably great, it is true, yet still remaining but a man in +his greatness. This sentiment would have appeared rank heresy to +Colonel Feraud. Some melancholy forebodings of a military kind expressed +cautiously would have been pronounced as nothing short of high treason +by Colonel Feraud. But Léonie, the sister of Colonel D'Hubert, read them +with positive satisfaction, and folding the letter thoughtfully remarked +to herself that “Armand was likely to prove eventually a sensible +fellow.” Since her marriage into a Southern family she had become a +convinced believer in the return of the legitimate king. Hopeful and +anxious she offered prayers night and morning, and burned candles in +churches for the safety and prosperity of her brother. + +She had every reason to suppose that her prayers were heard. Colonel +D'Hubert passed through Lutzen, Bautzen, and Leipsic, losing no limbs +and acquiring additional reputation. Adapting his conduct to the needs +of that desperate time, he had never voiced his misgivings. He concealed +them under a cheerful courtesy of such pleasant character that people +were inclined to ask themselves with wonder whether Colonel D'Hubert +was aware of any disasters. Not only his manners but even his glances +remained untroubled. The steady amenity of his blue eyes disconcerted +all grumblers, silenced doleful remarks, and made even despair pause. + +This bearing was remarked at last by the emperor himself, for Colonel +D'Hubert, attached now to the Major-General's staff, came on several +occasions under the imperial eye. But it exasperated the higher strung +nature of Colonel Feraud. Passing through Magdeburg on service this last +allowed himself, while seated gloomily at dinner with the _Commandant +de Place_, to say of his lifelong adversary: “This man does not love +the emperor,”--and as his words were received in profound silence Colonel +Feraud, troubled in his conscience at the atrocity of the aspersion, +felt the need to back it up by a good argument. “I ought to know him,” + he said, adding some oaths. “One studies one's adversary. I have met him +on the ground half a dozen times, as all the army knows. What more do +you want? If that isn't opportunity enough for any fool to size up his +man, may the devil take me if I can tell what is.” And he looked around +the table with sombre obstinacy. + +Later on, in Paris, while feverishly busy reorganising his regiment, +Colonel Feraud learned that Colonel D'Hubert had been made a general. He +glared at his informant incredulously, then folded his arms and turned +away muttering: + +“Nothing surprises me on the part of that man.” + +And aloud he added, speaking over his shoulder: “You would greatly +oblige me by telling General D'Hubert at the first opportunity that his +advancement saves him for a time from a pretty hot encounter. I was only +waiting for him to turn up here.” + +The other officer remonstrated. + +“Could you think of it, Colonel Feraud! At this time when every life +should be consecrated to the glory and safety of France!” + +But the strain of unhappiness caused by military reverses had spoiled +Colonel Feraud's character. Like many other men he was rendered wicked +by misfortune. + +“I cannot consider General D'Hubert's person of any account either +for the glory or safety of France,” he snapped viciously. “You don't +pretend, perhaps, to know him better than I do--who have been with him +half a dozen times on the ground--do you?” + +His interlocutor, a young man, was silenced. Colonel Feraud walked up +and down the room. + +“This is not a time to mince matters,” he said. “I can't believe that +that man ever loved the emperor. He picked up his general's stars under +the boots of Marshal Berthier. Very well. I'll get mine in another +fashion, and then we shall settle this business which has been dragging +on too long.” + +General D'Hubert, informed indirectly of Colonel Feraud's attitude, made +a gesture as if to put aside an importunate person. His thoughts were +solicited by graver cares. He had had no time to go and see his family. +His sister, whose royalist hopes were rising higher every day, though +proud of her brother, regretted his recent advancement in a measure, +because it put on him a prominent mark of the usurper's favour which +later on could have an adverse influence upon his career. He wrote +to her that no one but an inveterate enemy could say he had got his +promotion by favour. As to his career he assured her that he looked no +farther forward into the future than the next battlefield. + +Beginning the campaign of France in that state of mind, General D'Hubert +was wounded on the second day of the battle under Laon. While being +carried off the field he heard that Colonel Feraud, promoted that moment +to general, had been sent to replace him in the command of his brigade. +He cursed his luck impulsively, not being able, at the first glance, +to discern all the advantages of a nasty wound. And yet it was by this +heroic method that Providence was shaping his future. Travelling slowly +south to his sister's country house, under the care of a trusty old +servant, General D'Hubert was spared the humiliating contacts and the +perplexities of conduct which assailed the men of the Napoleonic empire +at the moment of its downfall. Lying in his bed with the windows of his +room open wide to the sunshine of Provence, he perceived at last the +undisguised aspect of the blessing conveyed by that jagged fragment of +a Prussian shell which, killing his horse and ripping open his thigh, +saved him from an active conflict with his conscience. After fourteen +years spent sword in hand in the saddle and strong in the sense of his +duty done to the end, General D'Hubert found resignation an easy virtue. +His sister was delighted with his reasonableness. “I leave myself +altogether in your hands, my dear Léonie,” he had said. + +He was still laid up when, the credit of his brother-in-law's family +being exerted on his behalf, he received from the Royal Government not +only the confirmation of his rank but the assurance of being retained on +the active list. To this was added an unlimited convalescent leave. +The unfavourable opinion entertained of him in the more irreconcilable +Bonapartist circles, though it rested on nothing more solid than the +unsupported pronouncement of General Feraud, was directly responsible +for General D'Hubert's retention on the active list. As to General +Feraud, his rank was confirmed, too. It was more than he dared to +expect, but Marshal Soult, then Minister of War to the restored king, +was partial to officers who had served in Spain. Only not even the +marshal's protection could secure for him active employment. He remained +irreconcilable, idle and sinister, seeking in obscure restaurants the +company of other half-pay officers, who cherished dingy but glorious +old tricolour cockades in their breast pockets, and buttoned with the +forbidden eagle buttons their shabby uniform, declaring themselves too +poor to afford the expense of the prescribed change. + +The triumphant return of the emperor, a historical fact as marvellous +and incredible as the exploits of some mythological demi-god, found +General D'Hubert still quite unable to sit a horse. Neither could he +walk very well. These disabilities, which his sister thought most lucky, +helped her immensely to keep her brother out of all possible mischief. +His frame of mind at that time, she noted with dismay, became very far +from reasonable. That general officer, still menaced by the loss of a +limb, was discovered one night in the stables of the château by a groom +who, seeing a light, raised an alarm of thieves. His crutch was lying +half buried in the straw of the litter, and he himself was hopping on +one leg in a loose box around a snorting horse he was trying to +saddle. Such were the effects of imperial magic upon an unenthusiastic +temperament and a pondered mind. Beset, in the light of stable lanterns, +by the tears, entreaties, indignation, remonstrances and reproaches of +his family, he got out of the difficult situation by fainting away there +and then in the arms of his nearest relatives, and was carried off to +bed. Before he got out of it again the second reign of Napoleon, the +Hundred Days of feverish agitation and supreme effort passed away like a +terrifying dream. The tragic year 1815, begun in the trouble and unrest +of consciences, was ending in vengeful proscriptions. + +How General Feraud escaped the clutches of the Special Commission and +the last offices of a firing squad, he never knew himself. It was partly +due to the subordinate position he was assigned during the Hundred Days. +He was not given active command but was kept busy at the cavalry depot +in Paris, mounting and despatching hastily drilled troopers into the +field. Considering this task as unworthy of his abilities, he discharged +it with no offensively noticeable zeal. But for the greater part he +was saved from the excesses of royalist reaction by the interference of +General D'Hubert. + +This last, still on convalescent leave but able now to travel, had been +despatched by his sister to Paris to present himself to his legitimate +sovereign. As no one in the capital could possibly know anything of the +episode in the stable, he was received there with distinction. Military +to the very bottom of his soul, the prospect of rising in his profession +consoled him from finding himself the butt of Bonapartist malevolence +which pursued him with a persistence he could not account for. All the +rancour of that embittered and persecuted party pointed to him as the +man who had _never_ loved the emperor--a sort of monster essentially +worse than a mere betrayer. + +General D'Hubert shrugged his shoulders without anger at this ferocious +prejudice. Rejected by his old friends and mistrusting profoundly the +advances of royalist society, the young and handsome general (he was +barely forty) adopted a manner of punctilious and cold courtesy which +at the merest shadow of an intended slight passed easily into harsh +haughtiness. Thus prepared, General D'Hubert went about his affairs in +Paris feeling inwardly very happy with the peculiar uplifting happiness +of a man very much in love. The charming girl looked out by his sister +had come upon the scene and had conquered him in the thorough manner in +which a young girl, by merely existing in his sight, can make a man of +forty her own. They were going to be married as soon as General D'Hubert +had obtained his official nomination to a promised command. + +One afternoon, sitting on the _terrasse_ of the Café Tortoni, General +D'Hubert learned from the conversation of two strangers occupying +a table near his own that General Feraud, included in the batch of +superior officers arrested after the second return of the king, was in +danger of passing before the Special Commission. Living all his spare +moments, as is frequently the case with expectant lovers a day +in advance of reality, as it were, and in a state of bestarred +hallucination, it required nothing less than the name of his perpetual +antagonist pronounced in a loud voice to call the youngest of Napoleon's +generals away from the mental contemplation of his betrothed. He looked +round. The strangers wore civilian clothes. Lean and weather-beaten, +lolling back in their chairs, they looked at people with moody and +defiant abstraction from under their hats pulled low over their eyes. It +was not difficult to recognise them for two of the compulsorily retired +officers of the Old Guard. As from bravado or carelessness they chose to +speak in loud tones, General D'Hubert, who saw no reason why he should +change his seat, heard every word. They did not seem to be the personal +friends of General Feraud. His name came up with some others; and +hearing it repeated General D'Hubert's tender anticipations of a +domestic future adorned by a woman's grace were traversed by the harsh +regret of that warlike past, of that one long, intoxicating clash of +arms, unique in the magnitude of its glory and disaster--the marvellous +work and the special possession of his own generation. He felt an +irrational tenderness toward his old adversary, and appreciated +emotionally the murderous absurdity their encounter had introduced into +his life. It was like an additional pinch of spice in a hot dish. He +remembered the flavour with sudden melancholy. He would never taste +it again. It was all over.... “I fancy it was being left lying in the +garden that had exasperated him so against me,” he thought indulgently. + +The two strangers at the next table had fallen silent upon the third +mention of General Feraud's name. Presently, the oldest of the two, +speaking in a bitter tone, affirmed that General Feraud's account was +settled. And why? Simply because he was not like some big-wigs who loved +only themselves. The royalists knew that they could never make anything +of him. He loved the Other too well. + +The Other was the man of St. Helena. The two officers nodded and touched +glasses before they drank to an impossible return. Then the same who had +spoken before remarked with a sardonic little laugh: + +“His adversary showed more cleverness.” + +“What adversary?” asked the younger as if puzzled. + +“Don't you know? They were two Hussars. At each promotion they fought a +duel. Haven't you heard of the duel that is going on since 1801?” + +His friend had heard of the duel, of course. Now he understood the +allusion. General Baron D'Hubert would be able now to enjoy his fat +king's favour in peace. + +“Much good may it do to him,” mumbled the elder. “They were both +brave men. I never saw this D'Hubert--a sort of intriguing dandy, I +understand. But I can well believe what I've heard Feraud say once of +him--that he never loved the emperor.” + +They rose and went away. + +General D'Hubert experienced the horror of a somnambulist who wakes +up from a complacent dream of activity to find himself walking on a +quagmire. A profound disgust of the ground on which he was making his +way overcame him. Even the image of the charming girl was swept from +his view in the flood of moral distress. Everything he had ever been +or hoped to be would be lost in ignominy unless he could manage to save +General Feraud from the fate which threatened so many braves. Under +the impulse of this almost morbid need to attend to the safety of his +adversary General D'Hubert worked so well with hands and feet (as the +French saying is) that in less than twenty-four hours he found means of +obtaining an extraordinary private audience from the Minister of Police. + +General Baron D'Hubert was shown in suddenly without preliminaries. In +the dusk of the minister's cabinet, behind the shadowy forms of writing +desk, chairs, and tables, between two bunches of wax candles blazing in +sconces, he beheld a figure in a splendid coat posturing before a tall +mirror. The old _Conventional_ Fouché, ex-senator of the empire, traitor +to every man, every principle and motive of human conduct, Duke of +Otranto, and the wily artisan of the Second Restoration, was trying the +fit of a court suit, in which his young and accomplished _fiancée_ had +declared her wish to have his portrait painted on porcelain. It was a +caprice, a charming fancy which the Minister of Police of the Second +Restoration was anxious to gratify. For that man, often compared in +wiliness of intellect to a fox but whose ethical side could be worthily +symbolised by nothing less emphatic than a skunk, was as much possessed +by his love as General D'Hubert himself. + +Startled to be discovered thus by the blunder of a servant, he met this +little vexation with the characteristic effrontery which had served +his turn so well in the endless intrigues of his self-seeking career. +Without altering his attitude a hair's breadth, one leg in a silk +stocking advanced, his head twisted over his left shoulder, he called +out calmly: + +“This way, general. Pray approach. Well? I am all attention.” + +While General D'Hubert, as ill at ease as if one of his own little +weaknesses had been exposed, presented his request as shortly as +possible, the minister went on feeling the fit of his collar, settling +the lappels before the glass or buckling his back in his efforts to +behold the set of the gold-embroidered coat skirts behind. His still +face, his attentive eyes, could not have expressed a more complete +interest in those matters if he had been alone. + +“Exclude from the operations of the Special Commission a certain Feraud, +Gabriel Florian, General of Brigade of the promotion of 1814?” he +repeated in a slightly wondering tone and then turned away from the +glass. “Why exclude him precisely?” + +“I am surprised that your Excellency, so competent in the valuation of +men of his time, should have thought it worth while to have that name +put down on the list.” + +“A rabid Bonapartist.” + +“So is every grenadier and every trooper of the army, as your Excellency +well knows. And the individuality of General Feraud can have no more +weight than that of any casual grenadier. He is a man of no mental +grasp, of no capacity whatever. It is inconceivable that he should ever +have any influence.” + +“He has a well-hung tongue though,” interjected Fouché. + +“Noisy, I admit, but not dangerous.” + +“I will not dispute with you. I know next to nothing of him. Hardly his +name in fact.” + +“And yet your Excellency had the presidency of the commission charged by +the king to point out those who were to be tried,” said General D'Hubert +with an emphasis which did not miss the minister's ear. + +“Yes, general,” he said, walking away into the dark part of the vast +room and throwing himself into a high-backed armchair whose overshadowed +depth swallowed him up, all but the gleam of gold embroideries on the +coat and the pallid patch of the face. “Yes, general. Take that chair +there.” + +General D'Hubert sat down. + +“Yes, general,” continued the arch-master in the arts of intrigue +and betrayal, whose duplicity as if at times intolerable to his +self-knowledge worked itself off in bursts of cynical openness. “I +did hurry on the formation of the proscribing commission and took its +presidency. And do you know why? Simply from fear that if I did not +take it quickly into my hands my own name would head the list of the +proscribed. Such are the times in which we live. But I am minister of +the king as yet, and I ask you plainly why I should take the name of +this obscure Feraud off the list? You wonder how his name got there. Is +it possible that you know men so little? My dear general, at the very +first sitting of the commission names poured on us like rain off the +tiles of the Tuileries. Names! We had our choice of thousands. How do +you know that the name of this Feraud, whose life or death don't matter +to France, does not keep out some other name?...” + +The voice out of the armchair stopped. General D'Hubert sat still, +shadowy, and silent. Only his sabre clinked slightly. The voice in the +armchair began again. “And we must try to satisfy the exigencies of the +allied sovereigns. The Prince de Talleyrand told me only yesterday that +Nesselrode had informed him officially that his Majesty, the Emperor +Alexander, was very disappointed at the small number of examples the +government of the king intends to make--especially amongst military men. +I tell you this confidentially.” + +“Upon my word,” broke out General D'Hubert, speaking through his teeth, +“if your Excellency deigns to favour me with any more confidential +information I don't know what I will do. It's enough to make one break +one's sword over one's knee and fling the pieces...” + +“What government do you imagine yourself to be serving?” interrupted the +minister sharply. After a short pause the crestfallen voice of General +D'Hubert answered: + +“The government of France.” + +“That's paying your conscience off with mere words, general. The truth +is that you are serving a government of returned exiles, of men who have +been without country for twenty years. Of men also who have just got +over a very bad and humiliating fright.... Have no illusions on that +score.” + +The Duke of Otranto ceased. He had relieved himself, and had attained +his object of stripping some self-respect off that man who had +inconveniently discovered him posturing in a gold-embroidered court +costume before a mirror. But they were a hot-headed lot in the army, +and it occurred to him that it would be inconvenient if a well-disposed +general officer, received by him on the recommendation of one of the +princes, were to go and do something rashly scandalous directly after +a private interview with the minister. In a changed voice he put a +question to the point: + +“Your relation--this Feraud?” + +“No. No relation at all.” + +“Intimate friend?” + +“Intimate... yes. There is between us an intimate connection of a nature +which makes it a point of honour with me to try...” + +The minister rang a bell without waiting for the end of the phrase. +When the servant had gone, after bringing in a pair of heavy silver +candelabra for the writing desk, the Duke of Otranto stood up, his +breast glistening all over with gold in the strong light, and taking a +piece of paper out of a drawer held it in his hand ostentatiously while +he said with persuasive gentleness: + +“You must not talk of breaking your sword across your knee, general. +Perhaps you would never get another. The emperor shall not return this +time.... _Diable d'homme!_ There was just a moment here in Paris, soon +after Waterloo, when he frightened me. It looked as though he were going +to begin again. Luckily one never does begin again really. You must not +think of breaking your sword, general.” + +General D'Hubert, his eyes fixed on the ground, made with his hand a +hopeless gesture of renunciation. The Minister of Police turned his +eyes away from him and began to scan deliberately the paper he had been +holding up all the time. + +“There are only twenty general officers to be brought before the Special +Commission. Twenty. A round number. And let's see, Feraud. Ah, he's +there! Gabriel Florian. _Parfaitement_. That's your man. Well, there +will be only nineteen examples made now.” + +General D'Hubert stood up feeling as though he had gone through an +infectious illness. + +“I must beg your Excellency to keep my interference a profound secret. I +attach the greatest importance to his never knowing...” + +“Who is going to inform him I should like to know,” said Fouché, raising +his eyes curiously to General D'Hubert's white face. “Take one of these +pens and run it through the name yourself. This is the only list in +existence. If you are careful to take up enough ink no one will be able +to tell even what was the name thus struck out. But, _par example_, I am +not responsible for what Clarke will do with him. If he persist in +being rabid he will be ordered by the Minster of War to reside in some +provincial town under the supervision of the police.” + +A few days later General D'Hubert was saying to his sister after the +first greetings had been got over: + +“Ah, my dear Léonie! It seemed to me I couldn't get away from Paris +quick enough.” + +“Effect of love,” she suggested with a malicious smile. + +“And horror,” added General D'Hubert with profound seriousness. “I have +nearly died there of... of nausea.” + +His face was contracted with disgust. And as his sister looked at him +attentively he continued: + +“I have had to see Fouché. I have had an audience. I have been in his +cabinet. There remains with one, after the misfortune of having to +breathe the air of the same room with that man, a sense of diminished +dignity, the uneasy feeling of being not so clean after all as one hoped +one was.... But you can't understand.” + +She nodded quickly several times. She understood very well on the +contrary. She knew her brother thoroughly and liked him as he was. +Moreover, the scorn and loathing of mankind were the lot of the Jacobin +Fouché, who, exploiting for his own advantage every weakness, every +virtue, every generous illusion of mankind, made dupes of his whole +generation and died obscurely as Duke of Otranto. + +“My dear Armand,” she said compassionately, “what could you want from +that man?” + +“Nothing less than a life,” answered General D'Hubert. “And I've got +it. It had to be done. But I feel yet as if I could never forgive the +necessity to the man I had to save.” + +General Feraud, totally unable as is the case with most men to +comprehend what was happening to him, received the Minister of War's +order to proceed at once to a small town of Central France with feelings +whose natural expression consisted in a fierce rolling of the eye and +savage grinding of the teeth. But he went. The bewilderment and awe at +the passing away of the state of war--the only condition of society he +had ever known--the prospect of a world at peace frightened him. He went +away to his little town firmly persuaded that this could not last. There +he was informed of his retirement from the army, and that his pension +(calculated on the scale of a colonel's half-pay) was made dependent on +the circumspection of his conduct and on the good reports of the police. +No longer in the army! He felt suddenly a stranger to the earth like a +disembodied spirit. It was impossible to exist. But at first he reacted +from sheer incredulity. This could not be. It could not last. The +heavens would fall presently. He called upon thunder, earthquakes, +natural cataclysms. But nothing happened. The leaden weight of an +irremediable idleness descended upon General Feraud, who, having no +resources within himself, sank into a state of awe-inspiring hebetude. +He haunted the streets of the little town gazing before him with +lack-lustre eyes, disregarding the hats raised on his passage; and the +people, nudging each other as he went by, said: “That's poor General +Feraud. His heart is broken. Behold how he loved the emperor!” + +The other living wreckage of Napoleonic tempest to be found in that +quiet nook of France clustered round him infinitely respectful of +that sorrow. He himself imagined his soul to be crushed by grief. He +experienced quickly succeeding impulses to weep, to howl, to bite his +fists till blood came, to lie for days on his bed with his head thrust +under the pillow; but they arose from sheer _ennui_, from the anguish +of an immense, indescribable, inconceivable boredom. Only his mental +inability to grasp the hopeless nature of his case as a whole saved him +from suicide. He never even thought of it once. He thought of nothing; +but his appetite abandoned him, and the difficulty of expressing the +overwhelming horror of his feelings (the most furious swearing could do +no justice to it) induced gradually a habit of silence:--a sort of death +to a Southern temperament. + +Great therefore was the emotion amongst the _anciens militaires_ +frequenting a certain little café full of flies when one stuffy +afternoon “that poor General Feraud” let out suddenly a volley of +formidable curses. + +He had been sitting quietly in his own privileged corner looking through +the Paris gazettes with about as much interest as a condemned man on +the eve of execution could be expected to show in the news of the day. +A cluster of martial, bronzed faces, including one lacking an eye and +another lacking the tip of a nose frost-bitten in Russia, surrounded him +anxiously. + +“What's the matter, general?” + +General Feraud sat erect, holding the newspaper at arm's length in order +to make out the small print better. He was reading very low to himself +over again fragments of the intelligence which had caused what may be +called his resurrection. + +“We are informed... till now on sick leave... is to be called to the +command of the 5th Cavalry Brigade in...” + +He dropped the paper stonily, mumbled once more... “Called to the +command”... and suddenly gave his forehead a mighty slap. + +“I had almost forgotten him,” he cried in a conscience-stricken tone. + +A deep-chested veteran shouted across the café: + +“Some new villainy of the government, general?” + +“The villainies of these scoundrels,” thundered General Feraud, “are +innumerable. One more, one less!...” He lowered his tone. “But I will +set good order to one of them at least.” + +He looked all round the faces. “There's a pomaded curled staff officer, +the darling of some of the marshals who sold their father for a handful +of English gold. He will find out presently that I am alive yet,” he +declared in a dogmatic tone.... “However, this is a private affair. +An old affair of honour. Bah! Our honour does not matter. Here we are +driven off with a split ear like a lot of cast troop horses--good only +for a knacker's yard. Who cares for our honour now? But it would be +like striking a blow for the emperor.... _Messieurs_, I require the +assistance of two of you.” + +Every man moved forward. General Feraud, deeply touched by this +demonstration, called with visible emotion upon the one-eyed veteran +cuirassier and the officer of the _Chasseurs à cheval_, who had left the +tip of his nose in Russia. He excused his choice to the others. + +“A cavalry affair this--you know.” + +He was answered with a varied chorus of “_Parfaitement mon Général... +C'est juste... Parbleu c'est connu..._” Everybody was satisfied. The +three left the café together, followed by cries of “_Bonne chance_.” + +Outside they linked arms, the general in the middle. The three rusty +cocked hats worn _en bataille_, with a sinister forward slant, barred +the narrow street nearly right across. The overheated little town of +gray stones and red tiles was drowsing away its provincial afternoon +under a blue sky. Far off the loud blows of some coopers hooping a cask, +reverberated regularly between the houses. The general dragged his left +foot a little in the shade of the walls. + +“That damned winter of 1813 got into my bones for good. Never mind. We +must take pistols, that's all. A little lumbago. We must have pistols. +He's sure game for my bag. My eyes are as keen as ever. Always were. You +should have seen me picking off the dodging Cossacks with a beastly old +infantry musket. I have a natural gift for firearms.” + +In this strain General Feraud ran on, holding up his head with owlish +eyes and rapacious beak. A mere fighter all his life, a cavalry man, a +_sabreur_, he conceived war with the utmost simplicity as in the main a +massed lot of personal contests, a sort of gregarious duelling. And here +he had on hand a war of his own. He revived. The shadow of peace had +passed away from him like the shadow of death. It was a marvellous +resurrection of the named Feraud, Gabriel Florian, _engagé volontaire_ +of 1793, general of 1814, buried without ceremony by means of a service +order signed by the War Minister of the Second Restoration. + + + + +IV + +No man succeeds in everything he undertakes. In that sense we are all +failures. The great point is not to fail in ordering and sustaining the +effort of our life. In this matter vanity is what leads us astray. It is +our vanity which hurries us into situations from which we must come out +damaged. Whereas pride is our safeguard by the reserve it imposes on +the choice of our endeavour, as much as by the virtue of its sustaining +power. + +General D'Hubert was proud and reserved. He had not been damaged by +casual love affairs successful or otherwise. In his war-scarred body +his heart at forty remained unscratched. Entering with reserve into his +sister's matrimonial plans, he felt himself falling irremediably in love +as one falls off a roof. He was too proud to be frightened. Indeed, the +sensation was too delightful to be alarming. + +The inexperience of a man of forty is a much more serious thing than +the inexperience of a youth of twenty, for it is not helped out by the +rashness of hot blood. The girl was mysterious, as all young girls +are, by the mere effect of their guarded ingenuity; and to him the +mysteriousness of that young girl appeared exceptional and fascinating. +But there was nothing mysterious about the arrangements of the match +which Madame Léonie had arranged. There was nothing peculiar, either. It +was a very appropriate match, commending itself extremely to the young +lady's mother (her father was dead) and tolerable to the young lady's +uncle--an old _émigré_, lately returned from Germany, and pervading cane +in hand like a lean ghost of the _ancien régime_ in a long-skirted brown +coat and powdered hair, the garden walks of the young lady's ancestral +home. + +General D'Hubert was not the man to be satisfied merely with the girl +and the fortune--when it came to the point. His pride--and pride aims +always at true success--would be satisfied with nothing short of love. +But as pride excludes vanity, he could not imagine any reason why this +mysterious creature, with deep and candid eyes of a violet colour, +should have any feeling for him warmer than indifference. The young lady +(her name was Adèle) baffled every attempt at a clear understanding on +that point. It is true that the attempts were clumsy and timidly made, +because by then General D'Hubert had become acutely aware of the number +of his years, of his wounds, of his many moral imperfections, of his +secret unworthiness--and had incidentally learned by experience the +meaning of the word funk. As far as he could make it out she seemed +to imply that with a perfect confidence in her mother's affection and +sagacity she had no pronounced antipathy for the person of General +D'Hubert; and that this was quite sufficient for a well-brought-up +dutiful young lady to begin married life upon. This view hurt and +tormented the pride of General D'Hubert. And yet, he asked himself with +a sort of sweet despair, What more could he expect? She had a quiet and +luminous forehead; her violet eyes laughed while the lines of her lips +and chin remained composed in an admirable gravity. All this was set off +by such a glorious mass of fair hair, by a complexion so marvellous, by +such a grace of expression, that General D'Hubert really never found the +opportunity to examine, with sufficient detachment, the lofty exigencies +of his pride. In fact, he became shy of that line of inquiry, since it +had led once or twice to a crisis of solitary passion in which it was +borne upon him that he loved her enough to kill her rather than lose +her. From such passages, not unknown to men of forty, he would come out +broken, exhausted, remorseful, a little dismayed. He derived, however, +considerable comfort from the quietist practice of sitting up now and +then half the night by an open window, and meditating upon the wonder of +her existence, like a believer lost in the mystic contemplation of his +faith. + +It must not be supposed that all these variations of his inward state +were made manifest to the world. General D'Hubert found no difficulty +in appearing wreathed in smiles: because, in fact, he was very happy. +He followed the established rules of his condition, sending over flowers +(from his sister's garden and hothouses) early every morning, and a +little later following himself to have lunch with his intended, her +mother, and her _émigré_ uncle. The middle of the day was spent in +strolling or sitting in the shade. A watchful deferential gallantry +trembling on the verge of tenderness, was the note of their intercourse +on his side--with a playful turn of the phrase concealing the profound +trouble of his whole being caused by her inaccessible nearness. Late in +the afternoon General D'Hubert walked home between the fields of vines, +sometimes intensely miserable, sometimes supremely happy, sometimes +pensively sad, but always feeling a special intensity of existence: that +elation common to artists, poets, and lovers, to men haunted by a great +passion, by a noble thought or a new vision of plastic beauty. + +The outward world at that time did not exist with any special +distinctness for General D'Hubert. One evening, however, crossing a +ridge from which he could see both houses, General D'Hubert became aware +of two figures far down the road. The day had been divine. The festal +decoration of the inflamed sky cast a gentle glow on the sober tints +of the southern land. The gray rocks, the brown fields, the purple +undulating distances harmonised in luminous accord, exhaled already +the scents of the evening. The two figures down the road presented +themselves like two rigid and wooden silhouettes all black on the ribbon +of white dust. General D'Hubert made out the long, straight-cut military +_capotes_, buttoned closely right up to the black stocks, the cocked +hats, the lean carven brown countenances--old soldiers--_vieilles +moustaches!_ The taller of the two had a black patch over one eye; +the other's hard, dry countenance presented some bizarre disquieting +peculiarity which, on nearer approach, proved to be the absence of the +tip of the nose. Lifting their hands with one movement to salute the +slightly lame civilian walking with a thick stick, they inquired for the +house where the General Baron D'Hubert lived and what was the best way +to get speech with him quietly. + +“If you think this quiet enough,” said General D'Hubert, looking round +at the ripening vine-fields framed in purple lines and dominated by the +nest of gray and drab walls of a village clustering around the top of a +steep, conical hill, so that the blunt church tower seemed but the shape +of a crowning rock--“if you think this quiet enough you can speak to +him at once. And I beg you, comrades, to speak openly with perfect +confidence.” + +They stepped back at this and raised again their hands to their hats +with marked ceremoniousness. Then the one with the chipped nose, +speaking for both, remarked that the matter was confidential enough and +to be arranged discreetly. Their general quarters were in that village +over there where the infernal clodhoppers--damn their false royalist +hearts--looked remarkably cross-eyed at three unassuming military men. +For the present he should only ask for the name of General D'Hubert's +friends. + +“What friends?” said the astonished General D'Hubert, completely off the +track. “I am staying with my brother-in-law over there.” + +“Well, he will do for one,” suggested the chipped veteran. + +“We're the friends of General Feraud,” interjected the other, who had +kept silent till then, only glowering with his one eye at the man who +had never loved the emperor. That was something to look at. For even +the gold-laced Judases who had sold him to the English, the marshals and +princes, had loved him at some time or other. But this man had _never_ +loved the emperor. General Feraud had said so distinctly. + +General D'Hubert felt a sort of inward blow in his chest. For an +infinitesimal fraction of a second it was as if the spinning of the +earth had become perceptible with an awful, slight rustle in the eternal +stillness of space. But that was the noise of the blood in his ears and +passed off at once. Involuntarily he murmured: + +“Feraud! I had forgotten his existence.” + +“He's existing at present, very uncomfortably it is true, in the +infamous inn of that nest of savages up there,” said the one-eyed +cuirassier drily. “We arrived in your parts an hour ago on post horses. +He's awaiting our return with impatience. There is hurry, you know. The +general has broken the ministerial order of sojourn to obtain from you +the satisfaction he's entitled to by the laws of honour, and naturally +he's anxious to have it all over before the _gendarmerie_ gets the +scent.” + +The other elucidated the idea a little further. + +“Get back on the quiet--you understand? Phitt! No one the wiser. We +have broken out, too. Your friend the king would be glad to cut off our +scurvy pittances at the first chance. It's a risk. But honour before +everything.” + +General D'Hubert had recovered his power of speech. + +“So you come like this along the road to invite me to a throat-cutting +match with that--that...” A laughing sort of rage took possession of +him. + +“Ha! ha! ha! ha!” + +His fists on his hips, he roared without restraint while they stood +before him lank and straight, as unexpected as though they had been shot +up with a snap through a trapdoor in the ground. Only four-and-twenty +months ago the masters of Europe, they had already the air of antique +ghosts, they seemed less substantial in their faded coats than their own +narrow shadows falling so black across the white road--the military and +grotesque shadows of twenty years of war and conquests. They had the +outlandish appearance of two imperturbable bronzes of the religion of +the sword. And General D'Hubert, also one of the ex-masters of Europe, +laughed at these serious phantoms standing in his way. + +Said one, indicating the laughing general with a jerk of the head: + +“A merry companion that.” + +“There are some of us that haven't smiled from the day the Other went +away,” said his comrade. + +A violent impulse to set upon and beat these unsubstantial wraiths to +the ground frightened General D'Hubert. He ceased laughing suddenly. +His urgent desire now was to get rid of them, to get them away from his +sight quickly before he lost control of himself. He wondered at this +fury he felt rising in his breast. But he had no time to look into that +peculiarity just then. + +“I understand your wish to be done with me as quickly as possible. Then +why waste time in empty ceremonies. Do you see that wood there at the +foot of that slope? Yes, the wood of pines. Let us meet there to-morrow +at sunrise. I will bring with me my sword or my pistols or both if you +like.” + +The seconds of General Feraud looked at each other. + +“Pistols, general,” said the cuirassier. + +“So be it. _Au revoir_--to-morrow morning. Till then let me advise you +to keep close if you don't want the _gendarmerie_ making inquiries about +you before dark. Strangers are rare in this part of the country.” + +They saluted in silence. General D'Hubert, turning his back on their +retreating figures, stood still in the middle of the road for a long +time, biting his lower lip and looking on the ground. Then he began to +walk straight before him, thus retracing his steps till he found himself +before the park gate of his intended's home. Motionless he stared +through the bars at the front of the house gleaming clear beyond the +thickets and trees. Footsteps were heard on the gravel, and presently a +tall stooping shape emerged from the lateral alley following the inner +side of the park wall. + +Le Chevalier de Valmassigue, uncle of the adorable Adèle, ex-brigadier +in the army of the princes, bookbinder in Altona, afterwards shoemaker +(with a great reputation for elegance in the fit of ladies' shoes) in +another small German town, wore silk stockings on his lean shanks, low +shoes with silver buckles, a brocaded waistcoat. A long-skirted coat _à +la Française_ covered loosely his bowed back. A small three-cornered hat +rested on a lot of powdered hair tied behind in a queue. + +“_Monsieur le Chevalier_,” called General D'Hubert softly. + +“What? You again here, _mon ami_? Have you forgotten something?” + +“By heavens! That's just it. I have forgotten something. I am come to +tell you of it. No--outside. Behind this wall. It's too ghastly a thing +to be let in at all where she lives.” + +The Chevalier came out at once with that benevolent resignation some +old people display towards the fugue of youth. Older by a quarter of a +century than General D'Hubert, he looked upon him in the secret of +his heart as a rather troublesome youngster in love. He had heard his +enigmatical words very well, but attached no undue importance to what a +mere man of forty so hard hit was likely to do or say. The turn of mind +of the generation of Frenchmen grown up during the years of his exile +was almost unintelligible to him. Their sentiments appeared to him +unduly violent, lacking fineness and measure, their language needlessly +exaggerated. He joined the general on the road, and they made a few +steps in silence, the general trying to master his agitation and get +proper control of his voice. + +“Chevalier, it is perfectly true. I forgot something. I forgot till +half an hour ago that I had an urgent affair of honour on my hands. It's +incredible but so it is!” + +All was still for a moment. Then in the profound evening silence of the +countryside the thin, aged voice of the Chevalier was heard trembling +slightly. + +“Monsieur! That's an indignity.” + +It was his first thought. The girl born during his exile, the posthumous +daughter of his poor brother, murdered by a band of Jacobins, had grown +since his return very dear to his old heart, which had been starving on +mere memories of affection for so many years. + +“It is an inconceivable thing--I say. A man settles such affairs before +he thinks of asking for a young girl's hand. Why! If you had forgotten +for ten days longer you would have been married before your memory +returned to you. In my time men did not forget such things--nor yet +what's due to the feelings of an innocent young woman. If I did not +respect them myself I would qualify your conduct in a way which you +would not like.” + +General D'Hubert relieved himself frankly by a groan. + +“Don't let that consideration prevent you. You run no risk of offending +her mortally.” + +But the old man paid no attention to this lover's nonsense. It's +doubtful whether he even heard. + +“What is it?” he asked. “What's the nature of...” + +“Call it a youthful folly, _Monsieur le Chevalier_. An inconceivable, +incredible result of...” + +He stopped short. “He will never believe the story,” he thought. “He +will only think I am taking him for a fool and get offended.” General +D'Hubert spoke up again. “Yes, originating in youthful folly it has +become...” + +The Chevalier interrupted. “Well then it must be arranged.” + +“Arranged.” + +“Yes. No matter what it may cost your _amour propre_. You should have +remembered you were engaged. You forgot that, too, I suppose. And then +you go and forget your quarrel. It's the most revolting exhibition of +levity I ever heard of.” + +“Good heavens, Chevalier! You don't imagine I have been picking up that +quarrel last time I was in Paris or anything of the sort. Do you?” + +“Eh? What matters the precise date of your insane conduct!” exclaimed +the Chevalier testily. “The principal thing is to arrange it...” + +Noticing General D'Hubert getting restive and trying to place a word, +the old _émigré_ raised his arm and added with dignity: + +“I've been a soldier, too. I would never dare to suggest a doubtful +step to the man whose name my niece is to bear. I tell you that _entre +gallants hommes_ an affair can be always arranged.” + +“But, _saperlotte, Monsieur le Chevalier_, it's fifteen or sixteen years +ago. I was a lieutenant of Hussars then.” + +The old Chevalier seemed confounded by the vehemently despairing tone of +this information. + +“You were a lieutenant of Hussars sixteen years ago?” he mumbled in a +dazed manner. + +“Why, yes! You did not suppose I was made a general in my cradle like a +royal prince.” + +In the deepening purple twilight of the fields, spread with vine leaves, +backed by a low band of sombre crimson in the west, the voice of the old +ex-officer in the army of the princes sounded collected, punctiliously +civil. + +“Do I dream? Is this a pleasantry? Or do you mean me to understand that +you have been hatching an affair of honour for sixteen years?” + +“It has clung to me for that length of time. That is my precise meaning. +The quarrel itself is not to be explained easily. We have been on the +ground several times during that time of course.” + +“What manners! What horrible perversion of manliness! Nothing can +account for such inhumanity but the sanguinary madness of the Revolution +which has tainted a whole generation,” mused the returned _émigré_ in a +low tone. “Who is your adversary?” he asked a little louder. + +“What? My adversary! His name is Feraud.” Shadowy in his_ tricorne_ and +old-fashioned clothes like a bowed thin ghost of the _ancien régime_ the +Chevalier voiced a ghostly memory. + +“I can remember the feud about little Sophie Derval between Monsieur de +Brissac, captain in the Bodyguards and d'Anjorrant. Not the pockmarked +one. The other. The Beau d'Anjorrant as they called him. They met three +times in eighteen months in a most gallant manner. It was the fault of +that little Sophie, too, who _would_ keep on playing...” + +“This is nothing of the kind,” interrupted General D'Hubert. He laughed +a little sardonically. “Not at all so simple,” he added. “Nor yet half +so reasonable,” he finished inaudibly between his teeth and ground them +with rage. + +After this sound nothing troubled the silence for a long time till the +Chevalier asked without animation: + +“What is he--this Feraud?” + +“Lieutenant of Hussars, too--I mean he's a general. A Gascon. Son of a +blacksmith, I believe.” + +“There! I thought so. That Bonaparte had a special predilection for +the _canaille_. I don't mean this for you, D'Hubert. You are one of us, +though you have served this usurper who...” + +“Let's leave him out of this,” broke in General D'Hubert. + +The Chevalier shrugged his peaked shoulders. + +“A Feraud of sorts. Offspring of a blacksmith and some village troll.... +See what comes of mixing yourself up with that sort of people.” + +“You have made shoes yourself, Chevalier.” + +“Yes. But I am not the son of a shoemaker. Neither are you, Monsieur +D'Hubert. You and I have something that your Bonaparte's, princes, +dukes, and marshals have not because there's no power on earth that +could give it to them,” retorted the _émigré_, with the rising animation +of a man who has got hold of a hopeful argument. “Those people don't +exist--all these Ferauds. Feraud! What is Feraud? A _va-nu-pieds_ +disguised into a general by a Corsican adventurer masquerading as an +emperor. There is no earthly reason for a D'Hubert to _s'encanailler_ +by a duel with a person of that sort. You can make your excuses to him +perfectly well. And if the _manant_ takes it into his head to decline +them you may simply refuse to meet him.” “You say I may do that?” “Yes. +With the clearest conscience.” “_Monsieur le Chevalier!_ To what do you +think you have returned from your emigration?” + +This was said in such a startling tone that the old exile raised sharply +his bowed head, glimmering silvery white under the points of the little +_tricorne_. For a long time he made no sound. + +“God knows!” he said at last, pointing with a slow and grave gesture +at a tall roadside cross mounted on a block of stone and stretching its +arms of forged stone all black against the darkening red band in the +sky. “God knows! If it were not for this emblem, which I remember seeing +in this spot as a child, I would wonder to what we, who have remained +faithful to our God and our king, have returned. The very voices of the +people have changed.” + +“Yes, it is a changed France,” said General D'Hubert. He had regained +his calm. His tone was slightly ironic. “Therefore, I cannot take your +advice. Besides, how is one to refuse to be bitten by a dog that means +to bite? It's impracticable. Take my word for it. He isn't a man to be +stopped by apologies or refusals. But there are other ways. I could, for +instance, send a mounted messenger with a word to the brigadier of the +_gendarmerie_ in Senlac. These fellows are liable to arrest on my simple +order. It would make some talk in the army, both the organised and the +disbanded. Especially the disbanded. All _canaille_. All my comrades +once--the companions in arms of Armand D'Hubert. But what need a +D'Hubert care what people who don't exist may think? Or better still, +I might get my brother-in-law to send for the mayor of the village and +give him a hint. No more would be needed to get the three 'brigands' +set upon with flails and pitchforks and hunted into some nice deep wet +ditch. And nobody the wiser! It has been done only ten miles from here +to three poor devils of the disbanded Red Lancers of the Guard going +to their homes. What says your conscience, Chevalier? Can a D'Hubert do +that thing to three men who do not exist?” + +A few stars had come out on the blue obscurity, clear as crystal, of the +sky. The dry, thin voice of the Chevalier spoke harshly. + +“Why are you telling me all this?” + +The general seized a withered, frail old hand with a strong grip. + +“Because I owe you my fullest confidence. Who could tell Adèle but you? +You understand why I dare not trust my brother-in-law nor yet my own +sister. Chevalier! I have been so near doing these things that I tremble +yet. You don't know how terrible this duel appears to me. And there's no +escape from it.” + +He murmured after a pause, “It's a fatality,” dropped the Chevalier's +passive hand, and said in his ordinary conversational voice: + +“I shall have to go without seconds. If it is my lot to remain on +the ground, you at least will know all that can be made known of this +affair.” + +The shadowy ghost of the _ancien régime_ seemed to have become more +bowed during the conversation. + +“How am I to keep an indifferent face this evening before those two +women?” he groaned. “General! I find it very difficult to forgive you.” + +General D'Hubert made no answer. + +“Is your cause good at least?” + +“I am innocent.” + +This time he seized the Chevalier's ghostly arm above the elbow, gave it +a mighty squeeze. + +“I must kill him,” he hissed, and opening his hand strode away down the +road. + +The delicate attentions of his adoring sister had secured for the +general perfect liberty of movement in the house where he was a guest. +He had even his own entrance through a small door in one corner of +the orangery. Thus he was not exposed that evening to the necessity +of dissembling his agitation before the calm ignorance of the other +inmates. He was glad of it. It seemed to him that if he had to open +his lips, he would break out into horrible imprecation, start breaking +furniture, smashing china and glasses. From the moment he opened the +private door, and while ascending the twenty-eight steps of winding +staircase, giving access to the corridor on which his room opened, he +went through a horrible and humiliating scene in which an infuriated +madman, with bloodshot eyes and a foaming mouth, played inconceivable +havoc with everything inanimate that may be found in a well-appointed +dining room. When he opened the door of his apartment the fit was over, +and his bodily fatigue was so great that he had to catch at the backs +of the chairs as he crossed the room to reach a low and broad divan +on which he let himself fall heavily. His moral prostration was still +greater. That brutality of feeling, which he had known only when +charging sabre in hand, amazed this man of forty, who did not recognise +in it the instinctive fury of his menaced passion. It was the revolt of +jeopardised desire. In his mental and bodily exhaustion it got cleared, +fined down, purified into a sentiment of melancholy despair at having, +perhaps, to die before he had taught this beautiful girl to love him. + +On that night General D'Hubert, either stretched on his back with his +hands over his eyes or lying on his breast, with his face buried in a +cushion, made the full pilgrimage of emotions. Nauseating disgust at +the absurdity of the situation, dread of the fate that could play such +a vile trick on a man, awe at the remote consequences of an apparently +insignificant and ridiculous event in his past, doubt of his own fitness +to conduct his existence and mistrust of his best sentiments--for what +the devil did he want to go to Fouché for?--he knew them all in turn. +“I am an idiot, neither more nor less,” he thought. “A sensitive idiot. +Because I overheard two men talk in a café... I am an idiot afraid of +lies--whereas in life it is only truth that matters.” + +Several times he got up, and walking about in his socks, so as not to +be heard by anybody downstairs, drank all the water he could find in +the dark. And he tasted the torments of jealousy, too. She would marry +somebody else. His very soul writhed. The tenacity of that Feraud, the +awful persistence of that imbecile brute came to him with the tremendous +force of a relentless fatality. General D'Hubert trembled as he put down +the empty water ewer. “He will have me,” he thought. General D'Hubert +was tasting every emotion that life has to give. He had in his dry mouth +the faint, sickly flavour of fear, not the honourable fear of a +young girl's candid and amused glance, but the fear of death and the +honourable man's fear of cowardice. + +But if true courage consists in going out to meet an odious danger from +which our body, soul and heart recoil together General D'Hubert had +the opportunity to practise it for the first time in his life. He had +charged exultingly at batteries and infantry squares and ridden with +messages through a hail of bullets without thinking anything about +it. His business now was to sneak out unheard, at break of day, to +an obscure and revolting death. General D'Hubert never hesitated. He +carried two pistols in a leather bag which he slung over his shoulder. +Before he had crossed the garden his mouth was dry again. He picked two +oranges. It was only after shutting the gate after him that he felt a +slight faintness. + +He stepped out disregarding it, and after going a few yards regained +the command of his legs. He sucked an orange as he walked. It was a +colourless and pellucid dawn. The wood of pines detached its columns of +brown trunks and its dark-green canopy very clearly against the rocks +of the gray hillside behind. He kept his eyes fixed on it steadily. That +temperamental, good-humoured coolness in the face of danger, which made +him an officer liked by his men and appreciated by his superiors, was +gradually asserting itself. It was like going into battle. Arriving at +the edge of the wood he sat down on a boulder, holding the other orange +in his hand, and thought that he had come ridiculously early on the +ground. Before very long, however, he heard the swishing of bushes, +footsteps on the hard ground, and the sounds of a disjointed loud +conversation. A voice somewhere behind him said boastfully, “He's game +for my bag.” + +He thought to himself, “Here they are. What's this about game? Are they +talking of me?” And becoming aware of the orange in his hand he thought +further, “These are very good oranges. Leonie's own tree. I may just as +well eat this orange instead of flinging it away.” + +Emerging from a tangle of rocks and bushes, General Feraud and his +seconds discovered General D'Hubert engaged in peeling the orange. They +stood still waiting till he looked up. Then the seconds raised their +hats, and General Feraud, putting his hands behind his back, walked +aside a little way. + +“I am compelled to ask one of you, messieurs, to act for me. I have +brought no friends. Will you?” + +The one-eyed cuirassier said judicially: + +“That cannot be refused.” + +The other veteran remarked: + +“It's awkward all the same.” + +“Owing to the state of the people's minds in this part of the country +there was no one I could trust with the object of your presence here,” + explained General D'Hubert urbanely. They saluted, looked round, and +remarked both together: + +“Poor ground.” + +“It's unfit.” + +“Why bother about ground, measurements, and so on. Let us simplify +matters. Load the two pairs of pistols. I will take those of General +Feraud and let him take mine. Or, better still, let us take a mixed +pair. One of each pair. Then we will go into the wood while you remain +outside. We did not come here for ceremonies, but for war. War to the +death. Any ground is good enough for that. If I fall you must leave me +where I lie and clear out. It wouldn't be healthy for you to be found +hanging about here after that.” + +It appeared after a short parley that General Feraud was willing to +accept these conditions. While the seconds were loading the pistols he +could be heard whistling, and was seen to rub his hands with an air of +perfect contentment. He flung off his coat briskly, and General D'Hubert +took off his own and folded it carefully on a stone. + +“Suppose you take your principal to the other side of the wood and let +him enter exactly in ten minutes from now,” suggested General D'Hubert +calmly, but feeling as if he were giving directions for his own +execution. This, however, was his last moment of weakness. + +“Wait! Let us compare watches first.” + +He pulled out his own. The officer with the chipped nose went over to +borrow the watch of General Feraud. They bent their heads over them for +a time. + +“That's it. At four minutes to five by yours. Seven to, by mine.” + +It was the cuirassier who remained by the side of General D'Hubert, +keeping his one eye fixed immovably on the white face of the watch he +held in the palm of his hand. He opened his mouth wide, waiting for the +beat of the last second, long before he snapped out the word: + +“_Avancez!_” + +General D'Hubert moved on, passing from the glaring sunshine of the +Provençal morning into the cool and aromatic shade of the pines. The +ground was clear between the reddish trunks, whose multitude, leaning at +slightly different angles, confused his eye at first. It was like going +into battle. The commanding quality of confidence in himself woke up in +his breast. He was all to his affair. The problem was how to kill his +adversary. Nothing short of that would free him from this imbecile +nightmare. “It's no use wounding that brute,” he thought. He was known +as a resourceful officer. His comrades, years ago, used to call him “the +strategist.” And it was a fact that he could think in the presence of +the enemy, whereas Feraud had been always a mere fighter. But a dead +shot, unluckily. + +“I must draw his fire at the greatest possible range,” said General +D'Hubert to himself. + +At that moment he saw something white moving far off between the trees. +The shirt of his adversary. He stepped out at once between the trunks +exposing himself freely, then quick as lightning leaped back. It had +been a risky move, but it succeeded in its object. Almost simultaneously +with the pop of a shot a small piece of bark chipped off by the bullet +stung his ear painfully. + +And now General Feraud, with one shot expended, was getting cautious. +Peeping round his sheltering tree, General D'Hubert could not see him +at all. This ignorance of his adversary's whereabouts carried with it a +sense of insecurity. General D'Hubert felt himself exposed on his flanks +and rear. Again something white fluttered in his sight. Ha! The enemy +was still on his front then. He had feared a turning movement. But, +apparently, General Feraud was not thinking of it. General D'Hubert saw +him pass without special haste from one tree to another in the straight +line of approach. With great firmness of mind General D'Hubert stayed +his hand. Too far yet. He knew he was no marksman. His must be a waiting +game--to kill. + +He sank down to the ground wishing to take advantage of the greater +thickness of the trunk. Extended at full length, head on to his enemy, +he kept his person completely protected. Exposing himself would not +do now because the other was too near by this time. A conviction that +Feraud would presently do something rash was like balm to General +D'Hubert's soul. But to keep his chin raised off the ground was irksome, +and not much use either. He peeped round, exposing a fraction of his +head, with dread but really with little risk. His enemy, as a matter of +fact, did not expect to see anything of him so low down as that. General +D'Hubert caught a fleeting view of General Feraud shifting trees again +with deliberate caution. “He despises my shooting,” he thought, with +that insight into the mind of his antagonist which is of such great help +in winning battles. It confirmed him in his tactics of immobility. “Ah! +if I only could watch my rear as well as my front!” he thought, longing +for the impossible. + +It required some fortitude to lay his pistols down. But on a sudden +impulse General D'Hubert did this very gently--one on each side. He had +been always looked upon as a bit of a dandy, because he used to shave +and put on a clean shirt on the days of battle. As a matter of fact he +had been always very careful of his personal appearance. In a man of +nearly forty, in love with a young and charming girl, this praiseworthy +self-respect may run to such little weaknesses as, for instance, being +provided with an elegant leather folding case containing a small ivory +comb and fitted with a piece of looking-glass on the outside. General +D'Hubert, his hands being free, felt in his breeches pockets for that +implement of innocent vanity, excusable in the possessor of long silky +moustaches. He drew it out, and then, with the utmost coolness and +promptitude, turned himself over on his back. In this new attitude, his +head raised a little, holding the looking-glass in one hand just clear +of his tree, he squinted into it with one eye while the other kept a +direct watch on the rear of his position. Thus was proved Napoleon's +saying, that for a French soldier the word impossible does not exist. He +had the right tree nearly filling the field of his little mirror. + +“If he moves from there,” he said to himself exultingly, “I am bound to +see his legs. And in any case he can't come upon me unawares.” + +And sure enough he saw the boots of General Feraud flash in and out, +eclipsing for an instant everything else reflected in the little mirror. +He shifted its position accordingly. But having to form his judgment of +the change from that indirect view, he did not realise that his own +feet and a portion of his legs were now in plain and startling view of +General Feraud. + +General Feraud had been getting gradually impressed by the amazing +closeness with which his enemy had been keeping cover. He had spotted +the right tree with bloodthirsty precision. He was absolutely certain of +it. And yet he had not been able to sight as much as the tip of an ear. +As he had been looking for it at the level of about five feet ten inches +it was no great wonder--but it seemed very wonderful to General Feraud. + +The first view of these feet and legs determined a rush of blood to his +head. He literally staggered behind his tree, and had to steady himself +with his hand. The other was lying on the ground--on the ground! +Perfectly still, too! Exposed! What did it mean?... The notion that he +had knocked his adversary over at the first shot then entered General +Feraud's head. Once there, it grew with every second of +attentive gazing, overshadowing every other +supposition--irresistible--triumphant--ferocious. + +“What an ass I was to think I could have missed him!” he said to +himself. “He was exposed _en plein_--the fool--for quite a couple of +seconds.” + +And the general gazed at the motionless limbs, the last vestiges of +surprise fading before an unbounded admiration of his skill. + +“Turned up his toes! By the god of war that was a shot!” he continued +mentally. “Got it through the head just where I aimed, staggered behind +that tree, rolled over on his back and died.” + +And he stared. He stared, forgetting to move, almost awed, almost sorry. +But for nothing in the world would he have had it undone. Such a shot! +Such a shot! Rolled over on his back, and died! + +For it was this helpless position, lying on the back, that shouted its +sinister evidence at General Feraud. He could not possibly imagine +that it might have been deliberately assumed by a living man. It was +inconceivable. It was beyond the range of sane supposition. There was no +possibility to guess the reason for it. And it must be said that +General D'Hubert's turned-up feet looked thoroughly dead. General Feraud +expanded his lungs for a stentorian shout to his seconds, but from what +he felt to be an excessive scrupulousness, refrained for a while. + +“I will just go and see first whether he breathes yet,” he mumbled +to himself, stepping out from behind his tree. This was immediately +perceived by the resourceful General D'Hubert. He concluded it to be +another shift. When he lost the boots out of the field of the mirror, he +became uneasy. General Feraud had only stepped a little out of the line, +but his adversary could not possibly have supposed him walking up with +perfect unconcern. General D'Hubert, beginning to wonder where the other +had dodged to, was come upon so suddenly that the first warning he had +of his danger consisted in the long, early-morning shadow of his +enemy falling aslant on his outstretched legs. He had not even heard a +footfall on the soft ground between the trees! + +It was too much even for his coolness. He jumped up instinctively, +leaving the pistols on the ground. The irresistible instinct of most +people (unless totally paralysed by discomfiture) would have been +to stoop--exposing themselves to the risk of being shot down in +that position. Instinct, of course, is irreflective. It is its very +definition. But it may be an inquiry worth pursuing, whether in +reflective mankind the mechanical promptings of instinct are not +affected by the customary mode of thought. Years ago, in his young +days, Armand D'Hubert, the reflective promising officer, had emitted the +opinion that in warfare one should “never cast back on the lines of +a mistake.” This idea afterward restated, defended, developed in many +discussions, had settled into one of the stock notions of his brain, +became a part of his mental individuality. And whether it had gone so +inconceivably deep as to affect the dictates of his instinct, or simply +because, as he himself declared, he was “too scared to remember the +confounded pistols,” the fact is that General D'Hubert never attempted +to stoop for them. Instead of going back on his mistake, he seized +the rough trunk with both hands and swung himself behind it with such +impetuosity that going right round in the very flash and report of a +pistol shot, he reappeared on the other side of the tree face to face +with General Feraud, who, completely unstrung by such a show of agility +on the part of a dead man, was trembling yet. A very faint mist of smoke +hung before his face which had an extraordinary aspect as if the lower +jaw had come unhinged. + +“Not missed!” he croaked hoarsely from the depths of a dry throat. + +This sinister sound loosened the spell which had fallen on General +D'Hubert's senses. + +“Yes, missed--a _bout portant_” he heard himself saying exultingly +almost before he had recovered the full command of his faculties. +The revulsion of feeling was accompanied by a gust of homicidal fury +resuming in its violence the accumulated resentment of a lifetime. +For years General D'Hubert had been exasperated and humiliated by an +atrocious absurdity imposed upon him by that man's savage caprice. +Besides, General D'Hubert had been in this last instance too unwilling +to confront death for the reaction of his anguish not to take the shape +of a desire to kill. + +“And I have my two shots to fire yet,” he added pitilessly. + +General Feraud snapped his teeth, and his face assumed an irate, +undaunted expression. + +“Go on,” he growled. + +These would have been his last words on earth if General D'Hubert had +been holding the pistols in his hand. But the pistols were lying on the +ground at the foot of a tall pine. General D'Hubert had the second's +leisure necessary to remember that he had dreaded death not as a man but +as a lover, not as a danger but as a rival--not as a foe to life but +as an obstacle to marriage. And, behold, there was the rival defeated! +Miserably defeated-crushed--done for! + +He picked up the weapons mechanically, and instead of firing them into +General Feraud's breast, gave expression to the thought uppermost in his +mind. + +“You will fight no more duels now.” + +[Illustration: frontispiece166.jpg “You will fight no more duels now.”] + +His tone of leisurely, ineffable satisfaction was too much for General +Feraud's stoicism. + +“Don't dawdle then, damn you for a coldblooded staff-coxcomb!” he roared +out suddenly out of an impassive face held erect on a rigid body. + +General D'Hubert uncocked the pistols carefully. This proceeding was +observed with a sort of gloomy astonishment by the other general. + +“You missed me twice,” he began coolly, shifting both pistols to one +hand. “The last time within a foot or so. By every rule of single combat +your life belongs to me. That does not mean that I want to take it now.” + +“I have no use for your forbearance,” muttered General Feraud savagely. + +“Allow me to point out that this is no concern of mine,” said General +D'Hubert, whose every word was dictated by a consummate delicacy of +feeling. In anger, he could have killed that man, but in cold blood, he +recoiled from humiliating this unreasonable being--a fellow soldier +of the Grand Armée, his companion in the wonders and terrors of the +military epic. “You don't set up the pretension of dictating to me what +I am to do with what is my own.” + +General Feraud looked startled. And the other continued: + +“You've forced me on a point of honour to keep my life at your disposal, +as it were, for fifteen years. Very well. Now that the matter is decided +to my advantage, I am going to do what I like with your life on the same +principle. You shall keep it at my disposal as long as I choose. Neither +more nor less. You are on your honour.” + +“I am! But _sacrebleu!_ This is an absurd position for a general of +the empire to be placed in,” cried General Feraud, in the accents of +profound and dismayed conviction. “It means for me to be sitting all the +rest of my life with a loaded pistol in a drawer waiting for your word. +It's... it's idiotic. I shall be an object of... of... derision.” + +“Absurd?... Idiotic? Do you think so?” queried argumentatively General +D'Hubert with sly gravity. “Perhaps. But I don't see how that can be +helped. However, I am not likely to talk at large of this adventure. +Nobody need ever know anything about it. Just as no one to this day, I +believe, knows the origin of our quarrel.... Not a word more,” he added +hastily. “I can't really discuss this question with a man who, as far as +I am concerned, does not exist.” + +When the duellists came out into the open, General Feraud walking a +little behind and rather with the air of walking in a trance, the two +seconds hurried towards them each from his station at the edge of the +wood. General D'Hubert addressed them, speaking loud and distinctly: + +“Messieurs! I make it a point of declaring to you solemnly in the +presence of General Feraud that our difference is at last settled for +good. You may inform all the world of that fact.” + +“A reconciliation after all!” they exclaimed together. + +“Reconciliation? Not that exactly. It is something much more binding. Is +it not so, general?” + +General Feraud only lowered his head in sign of assent. The two veterans +looked at each other. Later in the day when they found themselves alone, +out of their moody friend's earshot, the cuirassier remarked suddenly: + +“Generally speaking, I can see with my one eye as far or even a little +farther than most people. But this beats me. He won't say anything.” + +“In this affair of honour I understand there has been from first to last +always something that no one in the army could quite make out,” declared +the chasseur with the imperfect nose. “In mystery it began, in mystery +it went on, and in mystery it is to end apparently....” + +General D'Hubert walked home with long, hasty strides, by no means +uplifted by a sense of triumph. He had conquered, but it did not seem +to him he had gained very much by his conquest. The night before he had +grudged the risk of his life which appeared to him magnificent, worthy +of preservation as an opportunity to win a girl's love. He had even +moments when by a marvellous illusion this love seemed to him already +his and his threatened life a still more magnificent opportunity of +devotion. Now that his life was safe it had suddenly lost it special +magnificence. It wore instead a specially alarming aspect as a snare for +the exposure of unworthiness. As to the marvellous illusion of conquered +love that had visited him for a moment in the agitated watches of the +night which might have been his last on earth, he comprehended now its +true nature. It had been merely a paroxysm of delirious conceit. Thus to +this man sobered by the victorious issue of a duel, life appeared robbed +of much of its charm simply because it was no longer menaced. + +Approaching the house from the back through the orchard and the kitchen +gardens, he could not notice the agitation which reigned in front. He +never met a single soul. Only upstairs, while walking softly along the +corridor, he became aware that the house was awake and much more noisy +than usual. Names of servants were being called out down below in a +confused noise of coming and going. He noticed with some concern that +the door of his own room stood ajar, though the shutters had not been +opened yet. He had hoped that his early excursion would have passed +unperceived. He expected to find some servant just gone in; but the +sunshine filtering through the usual cracks enabled him to see lying +on the low divan something bulky which had the appearance of two women +clasped in each other's arms. Tearful and consolatory murmurs issued +mysteriously from that appearance. General D'Hubert pulled open the +nearest pair of shutters violently. One of the women then jumped up. It +was his sister. She stood for a moment with her hair hanging down and +her arms raised straight up above her head, and then flung herself with +a stifled cry into his arms. He returned her embrace, trying at the same +time to disengage himself from it. The other woman had not risen. She +seemed, on the contrary, to cling closer to the divan, hiding her face +in the cushions. Her hair was also loose; it was admirably fair. General +D'Hubert recognised it with staggering emotion. Mlle. de Valmassigue! +Adèle! In distress! + +He became greatly alarmed and got rid of his sister's hug definitely. +Madame Léonie then extended her shapely bare arm out of her peignoir, +pointing dramatically at the divan: + +“This poor terrified child has rushed here two miles from home on +foot--running all the way.” + +“What on earth has happened?” asked General D'Hubert in a low, agitated +voice. But Madame Léonie was speaking loudly. + +“She rang the great bell at the gate and roused all the household--we +were all asleep yet. You may imagine what a terrible shock.... Adèle, my +dear child, sit up.” + +General D'Hubert's expression was not that of a man who imagines +with facility. He did, however, fish out of chaos the notion that his +prospective mother-in-law had died suddenly, but only to dismiss it at +once. He could not conceive the nature of the event, of the catastrophe +which could induce Mlle, de Valmassigue living in a house full of +servants, to bring the news over the fields herself, two miles, running +all the way. + +“But why are you in this room?” he whispered, full of awe. + +“Of course I ran up to see and this child... I did not notice it--she +followed me. It's that absurd Chevalier,” went on Madame Léonie, looking +towards the divan.... “Her hair's come down. You may imagine she did not +stop to call her maid to dress it before she started.... Adèle, my +dear, sit up.... He blurted it all out to her at half-past four in the +morning. She woke up early, and opened her shutters, to breathe the +fresh air, and saw him sitting collapsed on a garden bench at the end of +the great alley. At that hour--you may imagine! And the evening before +he had declared himself indisposed. She just hurried on some clothes and +flew down to him. One would be anxious for less. He loves her, but not +very intelligently. He had been up all night, fully dressed, the poor +old man, perfectly exhausted! He wasn't in a state to invent a plausible +story.... What a confidant you chose there!... My husband was furious! +He said: 'We can't interfere now.' So we sat down to wait. It was awful. +And this poor child running over here publicly with her hair loose. +She has been seen by people in the fields. She has roused the whole +household, too. It's awkward for her. Luckily you are to be married next +week.... Adèle, sit up. He has come home on his own legs, thank God.... +We expected you to come back on a stretcher perhaps--what do I know? Go +and see if the carriage is ready. I must take this child to her mother +at once. It isn't proper for her to stay here a minute longer.” + +General D'Hubert did not move. It was as though he had heard nothing. +Madame Léonie changed her mind. + +“I will go and see to it myself,” she said. “I want also to get my +cloak... Adèle...” she began, but did not say “sit up.” She went out +saying in a loud, cheerful tone: “I leave the door open.” + +General D'Hubert made a movement towards the divan, but then Adèle +sat up and that checked him dead. He thought, “I haven't washed this +morning. I must look like an old tramp. There's earth on the back of +my coat, and pine needles in my hair.” It occurred to him that the +situation required a good deal of circumspection on his part. + +“I am greatly concerned, mademoiselle,” he began timidly, and abandoned +that line. She was sitting up on the divan with her cheeks +unusually pink, and her hair brilliantly fair, falling all over her +shoulders--which was a very novel sight to the general. He walked away +up the room and, looking out of the window for safety, said: “I fear you +must think I behaved like a madman,” in accents of sincere despair.... +Then he spun round and noticed that she had followed him with her eyes. +They were not cast down on meeting his glance. And the expression of her +face was novel to him also. It was, one might have said, reversed. Her +eyes looked at him with grave thoughtfulness, while the exquisite lines +of her mouth seemed to suggest a restrained smile. This change made her +transcendental beauty much less mysterious, much more accessible to a +man's comprehension. An amazing ease of mind came to the general--and +even some ease of manner. He walked down the room with as much +pleasurable excitement as he would have found in walking up to a battery +vomiting death, fire, and smoke, then stood looking down with smiling +eyes at the girl whose marriage with him (next week) had been so +carefully arranged by the wise, the good, the admirable Léonie. + +“Ah, mademoiselle,” he said in a tone of courtly deference. “If I could +be certain that you did not come here this morning only from a sense of +duty to your mother!” + +He waited for an answer, imperturbable but inwardly elated. It came in a +demure murmur, eyelashes lowered with fascinating effect. + +“You mustn't be _méchant_ as well as mad.” + +And then General D'Hubert made an aggressive movement towards the divan +which nothing could check. This piece of furniture was not exactly in +the line of the open door. But Madame Léonie, coming back wrapped up in +a light cloak and carrying a lace shawl on her arm for Adèle to hide +her incriminating hair under, had a vague impression of her brother +getting-up from his knees. + +“Come along, my dear child,” she cried from the doorway. + +The general, now himself again in the fullest sense, showed the +readiness of a resourceful cavalry officer and the peremptoriness of a +leader of men. + +“You don't expect her to walk to the carriage,” he protested. “She isn't +fit. I will carry her downstairs.” + +This he did slowly, followed by his awed and respectful sister. But he +rushed back like a whirlwind to wash away all the signs of the night of +anguish and the morning of war, and to put on the festive garments of a +conqueror before hurrying over to the other house. Had it not been for +that, General D'Hubert felt capable of mounting a horse and pursuing his +late adversary in order simply to embrace him from excess of happiness. +“I owe this piece of luck to that stupid brute,” he thought. “This duel +has made plain in one morning what might have taken me years to find +out--for I am a timid fool. No self-confidence whatever. Perfect coward. +And the Chevalier! Dear old man!” General D'Hubert longed to embrace +him, too. + +The Chevalier was in bed. For several days he was much indisposed. The +men of the empire, and the post-revolution young ladies, were too much +for him. He got up the day before the wedding, and being curious by +nature, took his niece aside for a quiet talk. He advised her to find +out from her husband the true story of the affair of honour, whose claim +so imperative and so persistent had led her to within an ace of tragedy. +“It is very proper that his wife should know. And next month or so +will be your time to learn from him anything you ought to know, my dear +child.” + +Later on when the married couple came on a visit to the mother of the +bride, Madame la Générale D'Hubert made no difficulty in communicating +to her beloved old uncle what she had learned without any difficulty +from her husband. The Chevalier listened with profound attention to the +end, then took a pinch of snuff, shook the grains of tobacco off the +frilled front of his shirt, and said calmly: “And that's all what it +was.” + +“Yes, uncle,” said Madame la Générale, opening her pretty eyes very +wide. “Isn't it funny? _C'est insensé_--to think what men are capable +of.” + +“H'm,” commented the old _émigré_. “It depends what sort of men. That +Bonaparte's soldiers were savages. As a wife, my dear, it is proper for +you to believe implicitly what your husband says.” + +But to Léonie's husband the Chevalier confided his true opinion. +“If that's the tale the fellow made up for his wife, and during the +honeymoon, too, you may depend on it no one will ever know the secret of +this affair.” + +Considerably later still, General D'Hubert judged the time come, and the +opportunity propitious to write a conciliatory letter to General Feraud. +“I have never,” protested the General Baron D'Hubert, “wished for your +death during all the time of our deplorable quarrel. Allow me to give +you back in all form your forfeited life. We two, who have been partners +in so much military glory, should be friendly to each other publicly.” + +The same letter contained also an item of domestic information. It was +alluding to this last that General Feraud answered from a little village +on the banks of the Garonne: + +“If one of your boy's names had been Napoleon, or Joseph, or even +Joachim, I could congratulate you with a better heart. As you have +thought proper to name him Charles Henri Armand I am confirmed in my +conviction that you never loved the emperor. The thought of that sublime +hero chained to a rock in the middle of a savage ocean makes life of so +little value that I would receive with positive joy your instructions to +blow my brains out. From suicide I consider myself in honour debarred. +But I keep a loaded pistol in my drawer.” + +Madame la Générale D'Hubert lifted up her hands in horror after perusing +that letter. + +“You see? He won't be reconciled,” said her husband. “We must take care +that he never, by any chance, learns where the money he lives on comes +from. It would be simply appalling.” + +“You are a _brave homme_, Armand,” said Madame la Générale +appreciatively. + +“My dear, I had the right to blow his brains out--strictly speaking. +But as I did not we can't let him starve. He has been deprived of his +pension for 'breach of military discipline' when he broke bounds to +fight his last duel with me. He's crippled with rheumatism. We are +bound to take care of him to the end of his days. And, after all, I +am indebted to him for the radiant discovery that you loved me a +little--you sly person. Ha! Ha! Two miles, running all the way!... It is +extraordinary how all through this affair that man has managed to engage +my deeper feelings.” + +THE END + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Point Of Honor, by Joseph Conrad + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE POINT OF HONOR *** + +***** This file should be named 17620-8.txt or 17620-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/6/2/17620/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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