P. C. Wren - The Collected Works of P. C. Wren - Complete Beau Geste Series, Novels & Short Stories

When we returned to the barrack-room, on the advice of Boldini, to be in time for the evening meal, I formally retained that experienced and acquisitive gentleman as guide, courier, and mentor, with the gift of ten francs and the promise of such future financial assistance as I could give and he should deserve.

"I am sorry I cannot spare more just at present," said I, in unnecessary apology for the smallness of the retaining fee; and his reply was illuminating.

"Ten francs, my dear sir," he said, "is precisely two hundred days' pay to a légionnaire . . . . Seven months' income. Think of it!" . . .

And I thought of it.

Decidedly I should need considerable promotion before being in a position to marry and live in comfort on my pay. . . .

§5.

"Dinner," that evening, at about five o'clock, consisted of similar " soupe ," good greyish bread, and unsweetened, milkless coffee. The first came, as before, in tin basins, called " gamelles "; the second was thrown to us from a basket; and the coffee was dipped from a pail, in tin mugs.

The soupe was a kind of stew, quite good and nourishing, but a little difficult to manipulate without spoon or fork. I found that my education was, in this respect, inferior to that of my comrades. After this meal--during which the German eyed our party malevolently, and Vogué, the gentleman who had objected to my opening the window, alluded to me as a "sacred nicodème ," whatever that may be--there was nothing to do but to adjourn once more to the canteen.

Here it was my privilege to entertain the whole band from the barrack-room, and I was interested to discover that both the German, whose name proved to be Glock, and the unpleasing Vogué, were both charmed to accept my hospitality, and to drown resentment, with everything else, in wine.

It is quite easy to be lavishly hospitable with wine at about a penny a pint.

Fun grew fast and furious, and I soon found that I was entertaining a considerable section of the French army, as well as the Legion's recruits.

I thoroughly enjoyed the evening, and was smitten upon the back, poked in the ribs, wrung by the hand, embraced about the neck, and, alas, kissed upon both cheeks by Turco, Zouave, Tirailleur, Artilleur, Marsouin, and Spahi, even before the battalion of bottles had been routed by the company of men.

I noticed that Boldini waxed more foreign, more voluble, and more unlovable, the more he drank.

If he could do anything else like a gentleman, he certainly could not carry his wine like one.

"Sah!" he hiccupped to me, with a strident laugh, "farmerly arlso there were a gross of bahtles and few men, and now arlso there are only gross men and a few bahtles!" and he smote me on the back to assist me to understand the jest. The more he went to pieces under the influence of liquor, the more inclined was I to think he had a larger proportion of Oriental strain than he pretended.

I liked him less and less as the evening wore on, and I liked him least when he climbed on the zinc-covered counter and sang an absolutely vile song, wholly devoid of humour or of anything else but offence. I am bound to admit, however, that it was very well received by the audience.

"What you t'ink of thatt , sah?" he enquired, when he had finished.

I replied that I preferred not to think of it, and proposed to address him in future as Cloaca Maxima.

Meanwhile, Hank and Buddy, those taciturn, observant, non-committal, and austerely-tolerant Americans, made hay while the sun of prosperity shone, drank more than any two of the others, said nothing, and seemed to wonder what all the excitement was about, and what made the "pore furriners" noisy.

"Ennybody 'ud think the boobs hed bin drinkin'," observed Buddy at last, breaking a long silence (his own silence, that is, of course). To which remark Hank replied:

"They gotta pretend thisyer wine-stuff is a hard drink, an act like they got a whiskey-jag an' was off the water-waggon. Only way to keep their sperrits up. . . . Wise guys too. You'd shore think some of 'em had bin drinkin' lickker. . . .

"Gee! . . . There's 'Taps!" he added, as the "Lights out" bugle blew in the courtyard, and the company broke up, "an' we gotta go to bed perishin' o' thirst, fer want of a drink. . . ."

Back to our barrack-room we reeled, singing joyously.

As I sat on my cot undressing, a little later, Buddy came over to me and said, in a low voice:

"Got 'ny money left, pard?"

"Why, yes. Certainly," I replied. "You're most welcome to . . ."

"Welcome nix," was the reply. "If you got 'ny money left, shove it inside yer piller an' tie the end up--or put it inside yer little vest an' lie on it. . . ."

"Hardly necessary, surely?" said I. "Looks rather unkind and suspicious, you know. . . ."

"Please yerself, pard, o' course," replied Buddy, "and let Mister Oompara Tarara Cascara Sagrada get it," and he glanced meaningly at Boldini, who was lying, fully dressed, on his cot.

"Oh, nonsense," said I, "he's not as bad as all that. . . ."

Buddy shrugged his shoulders and departed.

"I gotta evil mind," he remarked as he did so.

I finished undressing, got into the dirty sheetless bed, put my money under my pillow, and then lay awake for a long time, dreaming of Isobel, of Brandon Abbas, and, with a sense of utter mystification, of the wretched "Blue Water" and its mysterious fate. . . .

Only last Wednesday. . . . Only eight people--one of whom it obviously must be. . . . A wretched vulgar thief. . . . And where were Michael and Digby now? Were they together, and only forty-eight hours ahead of me on the Path of Glory, which, according to Boldini, led to the grave with a certainty and a regularity bordering upon monotony? . . . I fell asleep. . . .

I was awakened in the morning by the shrilling of bugles.

A corporal entered the room, bawled:

" Levez-vous donc! Levez-vous donc! " at the top of his voice, and departed.

I partly dressed, and then felt beneath my pillow for my money.

It was not there.

I felt savage and sick. . . . Robbed! . . . The beastly curs. . . .

"Here it is," said the voice of Buddy behind me. "Thought I'd better mind it when I aheered yore nose-sighs. . . . Shore enuff, about four a.m. this morning, over comes Mister Cascara Sagrada to see how youse agettin' on. . . . ' All right, Bo ,' ses I, speakin' innercent in me slumbers, ' I'm amindin' of it ,' I ses. . . ."

"No?" said I, "not really?"

"You betcha," replied Buddy, "an' Mister Cascara Sagrada says, ' Oh, I thought somebody might try to rob him ,' he says. . . . ' So did I ,' I says, ' And I was right too ,' I says, an' the skunk scoots back to his hole."

"Thanks, Buddy," I said, feeling foolish, as I took the notes and coins.

"I tried to put you wise, Bo," he replied, "and now you know."

Curiously enough, it did not enter my mind to doubt the truth of what he had told me.

After a breakfast-lunch of soupe and bread, we were ordered by a sergeant to assemble in the courtyard.

Here he called the roll of our names, and those of a freshly-arrived draft of recruits; formed us in fours, and marched us to the bassin , where a steamer of the Messageries Maritimes line, the Général Negrier , awaited us.

We were herded to the fo'c'sle of this aged packet, and bidden by the corporal, who was going in charge of us, to use the ocean freely if we should chance to feel unwell, as it was entirely at our disposal.

"'We have fed our seas for a thousand years,'" thought I, and was grateful that, on this glorious day, the sea did not look at all hungry.

But if the sea were not, we soldiers of misfortune undoubtedly were. Very hungry, indeed, and as the hours passed, we grew still hungrier. Towards evening, the Château d'If and the tall lighthouse having been left far behind, murmurs on the subject of dinner began to be heard. We loafed moodily about the well-deck, between the fo'c'sle and the high midship bridge structure, talking both in sorrow and in anger, on the subject of food.