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 by
inquiries as being 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 not observed anything unusual in their demeanour.
Lieut. 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
reckless gossip 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
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. They belonged also to different and distant
parts of France. There were other physical impossibilities, too. A
sub-commissary of the Intendence, an agreeable and cultivated bachelor
in kerseymere 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 this 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. Humiliation
at having been worsted arms in hand, and an uneasy feeling of having
been involved in a scrape by the injustice of fate, kept Lieut. Feraud
savagely dumb. He mistrusted the sympathy of mankind. That would, of
course, go to that dandified staff officer. Lying in bed, he raved aloud
to the pretty maid who administered to his needs with devotion, and
listened to his horrible imprecations with alarm. That Lieut. D'Hubert
should be made to "pay for it," seemed to her just and natural. Her
principal care was that Lieut. 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.
Lieut. D'Hubert kept silent for the immediate reason that there was no
one, except a stupid young soldier servant, to speak to. Further, 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
Lieut. 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 Lieut. 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. Lieut.
D'Hubert, liberated without remark, took up his regimental duties; and
Lieut. Feraud, his arm just out of the 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 him so
well, that at the first rumour of an armistice being signed he could
turn without misgivings to the thoughts of his private warfare.
This time it was to be regular warfare. He sent two friends to Lieut.
D'Hubert, whose regiment was stationed only a few miles away. Those
friends had asked no questions of their principal. "I owe him one, that
pretty staff officer," he had said, grimly, and they went away quite
contentedly on their mission. Lieut. D'Hubert had no difficulty in
finding two friends equally discreet and devoted to their principal.
"There's a crazy fellow to whom I must give a lesson," he had declared
curtly; 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 Lieut. D'Hubert
found himself lying on his back on the dewy grass with a hole in his
side. A serene sun rising over a landscape of meadows and woods 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.
Lieut. D'Hubert heard these words with pleasure. One of his seconds,
sitting on the wet grass, and 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 Lieut. D'Hubert, in a feeble
voice. "However, if he . . ."
In another part of the meadow the seconds of Lieut. 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 Lieut. Feraud
through his teeth, and 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 Lieut. D'Hubert, very
popular as a good comrade uniting great bravery with a frank and equable
temper, had many visitors. It was remarked that Lieut. Feraud did not,
as is 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 Lieut. D'Hubert had got worsted this
time, his sword play was commended. No one could deny that it was very
close, very scientific. It was even whispered that if he got touched it
was because he wished to spare his adversary. But by many the vigour and
dash of Lieut. 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. But
after all they knew best what the care of their honour dictated. It was
not a matter for their comrades to pry into over-much. As to the origin
of the quarrel, the general impression was that it dated from the time
they were holding garrison in Strasbourg. The musical surgeon shook his
head at that. It went much farther back, he thought.
"Why, of course! You must know the whole story," cried several voices,
eager with curiosity. "What was it?"
He raised his eyes from his glass deliberately. "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 any 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 correctness 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 young men would
leave the task of their reconciliation. Unfortunately they began by
approaching Lieut. Feraud, on the assumption 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, Lieut. Feraud had condescended in the
secret of his heart to review the case, and even had come 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 at
it, and this disgust, by a paradoxical logic, reawakened his animosity
against Lieut. D'Hubert. Was he to be pestered with this fellow for
ever--the fellow who had an infernal knack of getting round people
somehow? And yet it was difficult to refuse point blank that mediation
sanctioned by the code of honour.
He met the difficulty by an attitude of grim reserve. He twisted his
moustache and used vague words. His case was perfectly clear. He was
not ashamed to state it before a proper Court of Honour, neither was he
afraid to defend it on the ground. 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 Lieut. D'Hubert, because the next time of meeting he need not
hope to get off with the mere trifle of three weeks in bed."
This boastful phrase might have been prompted by the most profound
Machiavellism. Southern natures often hide, under the outward
impulsiveness of action and speech, a certain amount of astuteness.
Lieut. Feraud, mistrusting the justice of men, by no means desired
a Court of Honour; and the above words, according so well with his
temperament, had also the merit of serving his turn. Whether meant so or
not, they found their way in less than four-and-twenty hours into Lieut.
D'Hubert's bedroom. In consequence Lieut. 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 Lieut. 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 fierce
discretion.
The colonel of Lieut. D'Hubert's regiment was a grey-haired,
weather-beaten warrior, who took a simple view of his responsibilities.
"I can't," he said 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 as mere civilians, they were born again
into a regiment as infants are born into a family, and it was that
military birth alone which counted.
At the sight of Lieut. D'Hubert standing before him very bleached
and hollow-eyed the heart of the old warrior felt a pang of 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 ministered to
his pride and commanded all 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. I would send the eight hundred and forty-three 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 Lieut. 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, Lieut. 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 tone softened. "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 7th Hussars? It's
simply disgraceful!"
Lieut. D'Hubert felt vexed beyond measure. His shoulders moved slightly.
He made no other answer. He could not ignore his responsibility.
The colonel veiled his glance and lowered his voice still more. "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 persuasive influence of kindness,
affected powerfully a man just risen from a bed of sickness. Lieut.
D'Hubert's hand, which grasped the knob of a stick, trembled
slightly. But his northern temperament, sentimental yet cautious and
clear-sighted, too, in its idealistic way, checked 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.
The colonel listened, interested at first, then looked mystified. At
last he frowned. "You hesitate?--mille tonnerres! Haven't I told you
that I will condescend to argue with you--as a friend?"
"Yes, Colonel!" answered Lieut. D'Hubert, gently. "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 Lieut. D'Hubert, in a faint but firm 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," protested Lieut. 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," said the
colonel, severely.
"No. It cannot be. But it can be by evil tongues. It will be said that
a lieutenant of the 4th 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," began the colonel very
fiercely, but ended the phrase on an uncertain note. The bravery of
Lieut. 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
tonnerres! . . . Sacre nom de nom . . ." he thought.
Lieut. D'Hubert coughed painfully, and added 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 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 farther. The
inquiry has been dropped--let it rest now. It would have been absolutely
fatal to Feraud."
"Hey! What! Did he behave so badly?"
"Yes. It was pretty bad," muttered Lieut. 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, a man capable of discreet sympathy. But he was human
in other ways, too, and this became 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 . . ."
Lieut. 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
mere detail. . . ."
The colonel stopped short. The reputation of Lieut. 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 4th Hussars, too," insisted Lieut.
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!"
Lieut. 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 Lieut. 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?"
Saying these words 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. He saw the
truth shining unmistakably in the gesture of Lieut. 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?"
Lieut. 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 Lieut. D'Hubert, helped by his liking for the man, had
convinced him. On the other hand, it was highly improper that his
intervention, of which he had made no secret, should produce no visible
effect. He kept Lieut. D'Hubert a few minutes 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, Lieut. D'Hubert said nothing to
the friend who was waiting outside to take him home. He said nothing to
anybody. Lieut. D'Hubert made no confidences. But on 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
lieut.-colonel, a dry, brown chip of a man with short side-whiskers,
pricked up his ears at that without letting a sign 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. Lieut. D'Hubert repelled by an
impassive silence all attempts to worm the truth out of him. Lieut.
Feraud, secretly uneasy at first, regained his assurance as time went
on. He disguised his ignorance of the meaning of the imposed truce by
slight 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 little truculent
air. And everybody admired his discretion.
Before the end of the truce Lieut. D'Hubert got his troop. The promotion
was well earned, but somehow no one seemed to expect the event. When
Lieut. Feraud heard of it at a gathering of officers, he muttered
through his teeth, "Is that so?" At once he unhooked his sabre from a
peg near the door, 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 superior rank there could be no
question of a duel. Neither of them could send or receive a challenge
without rendering himself amenable to a court-martial. It was not to be
thought of. Lieut. Feraud, who for many days now had experienced no
real desire to meet Lieut. D'Hubert arms in hand, chafed again at the
systematic injustice of fate. "Does he think he will escape me in that
way?" he thought, indignantly. He saw in this promotion an intrigue, a
conspiracy, a cowardly manoeuvre. That colonel knew what he was doing.
He had hastened to recommend his favourite for a step. 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, Lieut. Feraud had been content to give and receive blows for
sheer love of armed strife, and without much thought of advancement; but
now an urgent desire to get on 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. Nevertheless,
neither the bravery nor the charm seemed to work very swiftly. Lieut.
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. But 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
my character."
He did not get his step till a week after Austerlitz. The Light Cavalry
of the Grand Army had its hands very full of interesting work for a
little while. Directly the pressure of professional occupation had been
eased Captain Feraud took measures to arrange a meeting without loss of
time. "I know my bird," 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 for that sort of thing."
This duel was fought in Silesia. If not fought 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 admiration of the beholders. It became
the subject of talk on both shores of the Danube, and as far as the
garrisons of Gratz and Laybach. They crossed blades seven times. Both
had many cuts 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 Captain
Feraud by a tremendous exaltation of his pugnacious instincts and the
incitement of wounded vanity. At last, dishevelled, their shirts in
rags, covered with gore and hardly able to stand, they were led away
forcibly 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 indefinitely. 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 corps to army corps, and penetrated at last to the smallest
detachments of the troops cantoned between the Rhine and the Save. In
the cafes in Vienna 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 transcendent 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 found
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
blood-shot, tired eyes. "I see that I must get rid of that intriguing
personage. Here he's managed to sneak on to 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 any more. Now 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 sentiment
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 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 and muttered triumphantly, "Aha! my pretty staff officer, I've got
you now."
Captain D'Hubert on his side, after staring hard for a considerable
time at his friends, 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
ironical smile, and said in his calm voice, "It certainly will do away
to some extent with the monotony of the thing."
When left alone, 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 all his aides-decamp particularly hard. The last three weeks of
campaigning in horrible weather had affected his health. When over-tired
he suffered from a stitch in his wounded side, and that uncomfortable
sensation always depressed him. "It's that brute's doing, too," 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 nineteen and he twenty-six, when he went away to garrison life in
Strasbourg, he had had but two short glimpses of her. They had been
great friends and confidants; and now she was going to be given 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 Leonie 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 in his mind about her happiness but
he felt ousted from the first place in her thoughts which had been his
ever since the girl could speak. 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 threw aside the letter of congratulation he had begun to write as in
duty bound, but without enthusiasm. He took a fresh piece of paper, and
traced on it the words: "This is my last will and testament." Looking at
these words he gave himself up to unpleasant reflection; a presentiment
that he would never see the scenes of his childhood weighed down the
equable spirits of Captain D'Hubert. He jumped up, pushing his chair
back, yawned elaborately in sign 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 fog.
"We are to fight before a gallery, it seems," he muttered to himself,
bitterly.
His seconds were rather concerned at the state of the atmosphere, but
presently a pale, sickly sun struggled out of the low vapours, and
Captain D'Hubert made out, in the distance, three horsemen riding a
little apart from the others. It was Captain Feraud 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 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 fields, 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--Charrrgez! . . . Presentiments of death don't come to
a man for nothing, he thought at the very moment he put spurs to his
horse.
And therefore he was more than surprised when, at the very first set-to,
Captain Feraud laid himself open to a cut over the forehead, which
blinding him with blood, ended the combat almost before it had fairly
begun. It was impossible to go on. Captain D'Hubert, leaving his enemy
swearing horribly and reeling in the saddle between his two appalled
friends, leaped the ditch again into the road 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 that he would feel rather lonely after
this great change in her life; but then the day would come for him, too,
to get married. In fact, he was thinking already of the time when there
would be no one left to fight with in Europe and the epoch of wars would
be over. "I expect then," he wrote, "to be within measurable distance
of a marshal's baton, and you will be an experienced married woman. You
shall look out a wife for me. I will be, probably, bald by then, and a
little blase. I shall require a young girl, pretty of course, and with
a large fortune, which should help me to close my glorious career in 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 depths 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 rest assured that your ever-loving brother is
not a duellist." Then Captain D'Hubert crumpled up the blank sheet of
paper headed 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 could do. He had suddenly acquired the
conviction that his adversary was utterly powerless to affect his life
in any sort of way; except, perhaps, in the way of putting a 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, in the mud, in the dust of
Polish plains, picking up distinction and advancement on all the roads
of North-eastern Europe. Meantime, Captain Feraud, despatched southwards
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; 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 beak-like curve of his nose was unpleasantly set off
by a deep fold on each side of his mouth. The round orbits of his eyes
radiated wrinkles. More than ever he recalled an irritable and staring
bird--something like a cross between a parrot and an owl. He was still
extremely outspoken in his dislike of "intriguing fellows." He seized
every opportunity to state that he did not pick up his rank in the
ante-rooms 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 a
mysterious, unforgivable offence.