第45章 I MEET TWO OF MY COUNTRYMEN(2)

'Shame, gentlemen!' he said.'Is this a time for Frenchmen and fellow-soldiers to fall out? We are in the midst of our enemies; a quarrel, a loud word, may suffice to plunge us back into irretrievable distress.MONSIEUR LE COMMANDANT, you have been gravely offended.I make it my request, I make it my prayer - if need be, I give you my orders - that the matter shall stand by until we come safe to France.Then, if you please, I will serve you in any capacity.And for you, young man, you have shown all the cruelty and carelessness of youth.This gentleman is your superior; he is no longer young' - at which word you are to conceive the Major's face.'It is admitted he has broken his parole.I know not his reason, and no more do you.It might be patriotism in this hour of our country's adversity, it might be humanity, necessity; you know not what in the least, and you permit yourself to reflect on his honour.To break parole may be a subject for pity and not derision.I have broken mine - I, a colonel of the Empire.And why? I have been years negotiating my exchange, and it cannot be managed; those who have influence at the Ministry of War continually rush in before me, and I have to wait, and my daughter at home is in a decline.I am going to see my daughter at last, and it is my only concern lest I should have delayed too long.She is ill, and very ill, - at death's door.

Nothing is left me but my daughter, my Emperor, and my honour; and I give my honour, blame me for it who dare!'

At this my heart smote me.

'For God's sake,' I cried, 'think no more of what I have said! Aparole? what is a parole against life and death and love? I ask your pardon; this gentleman's also.As long as I shall be with you, you shall not have cause to complain of me again.I pray God you will find your daughter alive and restored.'

'That is past praying for,' said the Colonel; and immediately the brief fire died out of him, and, returning to the hearth, he relapsed into his former abstraction.

But I was not so easy to compose.The knowledge of the poor gentleman's trouble, and the sight of his face, had filled me with the bitterness of remorse; and I insisted upon shaking hands with the Major (which he did with a very ill grace), and abounded in palinodes and apologies.

'After all,' said I, 'who am I to talk? I am in the luck to be a private soldier; I have no parole to give or to keep; once I am over the rampart, I am as free as air.I beg you to believe that I regret from my soul the use of these ungenerous expressions.Allow me...Is there no way in this damned house to attract attention?

Where is this fellow, Fenn?'

I ran to one of the windows and threw it open.Fenn, who was at the moment passing below in the court, cast up his arms like one in despair, called to me to keep back, plunged into the house, and appeared next moment in the doorway of the chamber.

'Oh, sir!' says he, 'keep away from those there windows.A body might see you from the back lane.'

'It is registered,' said I.'Henceforward I will be a mouse for precaution and a ghost for invisibility.But in the meantime, for God's sake, fetch us a bottle of brandy! Your room is as damp as the bottom of a well, and these gentlemen are perishing of cold.'

So soon as I had paid him (for everything, I found, must be paid in advance), I turned my attention to the fire, and whether because I threw greater energy into the business, or because the coals were now warmed and the time ripe, I soon started a blaze that made the chimney roar again.The shine of it, in that dark, rainy day, seemed to reanimate the Colonel like a blink of sun.With the outburst of the flames, besides, a draught was established, which immediately delivered us from the plague of smoke; and by the time Fenn returned, carrying a bottle under his arm and a single tumbler in his hand, there was already an air of gaiety in the room that did the heart good.

I poured out some of the brandy.

'Colonel,' said I, 'I am a young man and a private soldier.I have not been long in this room, and already I have shown the petulance that belongs to the one character and the ill manners that you may look for in the other.Have the humanity to pass these slips over, and honour me so far as to accept this glass.'

'My lad,' says he, waking up and blinking at me with an air of suspicion, 'are you sure you can afford it?'

I assured him I could.

'I thank you, then: I am very cold.' He took the glass out, and a little colour came in his face.'I thank you again,' said he.'It goes to the heart.'

The Major, when I motioned him to help himself, did so with a good deal of liberality; continued to do so for the rest of the morning, now with some sort of apology, now with none at all; and the bottle began to look foolish before dinner was served.It was such a meal as he had himself predicted: beef, greens, potatoes, mustard in a teacup, and beer in a brown jug that was all over hounds, horses, and hunters, with a fox at the fat end and a gigantic John Bull -

for all the world like Fenn - sitting in the midst in a bob-wig and smoking tobacco.The beer was a good brew, but not good enough for the Major; he laced it with brandy - for his cold, he said; and in this curative design the remainder of the bottle ebbed away.He called my attention repeatedly to the circumstance; helped me pointedly to the dregs, threw the bottle in the air and played tricks with it; and at last, having exhausted his ingenuity, and seeing me remain quite blind to every hint, he ordered and paid for another himself.

As for the Colonel, he ate nothing, sat sunk in a muse, and only awoke occasionally to a sense of where he was, and what he was supposed to be doing.On each of these occasions he showed a gratitude and kind courtesy that endeared him to me beyond expression.'Champdivers, my lad, your health!' he would say.