Here had we two expatriated Frenchmen
engaged in an ill-regulated combat like the battles of beasts.
Here was he, who had been all his life so great a ruffian, dying in
a foreign land of this ignoble injury, and meeting death with
something of the spirit of a Bayard. I insisted that the guards
should be summoned and a doctor brought. 'It may still be possible
to save him,' I cried.
The sergeant-major reminded me of our engagement. 'If you had been
wounded,' said he, 'you must have lain there till the patrol came
by and found you. It happens to be Goguelat--and so must he!
Come, child, time to go to by-by.' And as I still resisted,
'Champdivers!' he said, 'this is weakness. You pain me.'
'Ay, off to your beds with you!' said Goguelat, and named us in a
company with one of his jovial gross epithets.
Accordingly the squad lay down in the dark and simulated, what they
certainly were far from experiencing, sleep. It was not yet late.
The city, from far below, and all around us, sent up a sound of
wheels and feet and lively voices. Yet awhile, and the curtain of
the cloud was rent across, and in the space of sky between the
eaves of the shed and the irregular outline of the ramparts a
multitude of stars appeared. Meantime, in the midst of us lay
Goguelat, and could not always withhold himself from groaning.
Pages:
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39