They made him stand twenty paces away from his enemy. He was asked:
“Are you ready?”
While he was answering, “Yes, monsieur,” he noticed that one of the
Englishmen had opened his umbrella in order to keep off the rays of the
sun.
A voice gave the signal:
“Fire!”
M. Dubuis fired at random without delay, and he was amazed to see the
Prussian opposite him stagger, lift up his arms and fall forward, dead.
He had killed the officer.
One of the Englishmen exclaimed: “Ah!” He was quivering with delight,
with satisfied curiosity and joyous impatience. The other, who still
kept his watch in his hand, seized M. Dubuis' arm and hurried him in
double-quick time toward the station, his fellow-countryman marking time
as he ran beside them, with closed fists, his elbows at his sides, “One,
two; one, two!”
And all three, running abreast rapidly, made their way to the station
like three grotesque figures in a comic newspaper.
The train was on the point of starting. They sprang into their carriage.
Then the Englishmen, taking off their travelling caps, waved them three
times over their heads, exclaiming:
“Hip! hip! hip! hurrah!”
And gravely, one after the other, they extended their right hands to M.
Dubuis and then went back and sat down in their own corner.