White Lies Part 67

"Ah! that I will: but how?"

"Take your pencil and write--'I authorize Colonel Dujardin to save the honor of the colonels of the second division.'"

The general hesitated. He had never seen an order so worded. But at last he took out his pencil and wrote the required order, after his own fas.h.i.+on; i.e., in milk and water:--

On account of the singular ability and courage with which Colonel Dujardin has conducted the operations against the Bastion St. Andre, a discretionary power is given him at the moment of a.s.sault to carry into effect such measures, as, without interfering with the commander-in-chief's order, may sustain his own credit, and that of the other colonels of the second division.

RAIMBAUT, General of Division.

Camille put the paper into his bosom.

"Now, general, you may leave all to me. I swear to you, Raynal shall not die--shall not lead this a.s.sault."

"Your hand, colonel. You are an honor to the French armies. How will you do it?"

"Leave it to me, general, it shall be done."

"I feel it will, my n.o.ble fellow: but, alas! I fear not without risking some valuable life or other, most likely your own. Tell me!"

"General, I decline."

"You refuse me, sir?"

"Yes; this order gives me a discretionary power. I will hand back the order at your command; but modify it I will not. Come, sir, you veteran generals have been unjust to me, and listened to me too little all through this siege, but at last you have honored me. This order is the greatest honor that was ever done me since I wore a sword.".

"My poor colonel!"

"Let me wear it intact, and carry it to my grave."

"Say no more! One word--Is there anything on earth I can do for you, my brave soldier?"

"Yes, general. Be so kind as to retire to your quarters; there are reasons why you ought not to be near this post in half an hour."

"I go. Is there NOTHING else?"

"Well, general, ask the good priest Ambrose, to pray for all those who shall die doing their duty to their country this afternoon."

They parted. General Raimbaut looked back more than once at the firm, intrepid figure that stood there unflinching, on the edge of the grave.

But HE never took his eye off Raynal. The next minute the sad letter was finished, and Raynal walked out of the tent, and confronted the man he had challenged to single combat.

I have mentioned elsewhere that Colonel Dujardin had eyes strangely compounded of battle and love, of the dove and the hawk. And these, softened by a n.o.ble act he meditated, now rested on Raynal with a strange expression of warmth and goodness. This strange gaze struck Raynal, so far at least as this; he saw it was no hostile eye. He was glad of that, for his own heart was calmed and softened by the solemn prospect before him.

"We, too, have a little account to settle before I order out the men,"

said he, calmly, "and I can't give you a long credit. I am pressed for time."

"Our quarrel is at an end. When duty sounds the recall, a soldier's heart leaves private feuds. See! I come to you without anger and ill-will. Just now my voice was loud, my manner, I dare say, offensive, and menacing even, and that always tempts a brave fellow like you to resist. But now, you see, I am harmless as a woman. We are alone. Humbug to the winds! I know that you are the only man in this army fit to command a division. I know that when you say the a.s.sault of that bastion is death, death it is. To the point then; now that my manner is no longer irritating, now that I am going to die, Camille Dujardin, my old comrade, have you the heart to refuse me? am I to die unhappy?"

"No; no: I will do whatever you like."

"You will marry that poor girl, then?"

"Yes."

"Aha! did not I always say he was a good fellow? Clench the nail; give me your honor."

"I give you my honor to marry her, if I live."

"You take a load off me; may Heaven reward you. In one hour those poor women, whose support I had promised to be, will lose their protector; but I give them another in you. We shall not leave that family in tears, Rose in shame, and your child without a name."

Dujardin stared at the speaker. What new and devilish deception was this?

"My child!" he faltered. "What child?"

"Ah," said Raynal, "what a fool I was! That is the first thing I ought to have told you. Poor little fellow! I surprised him in his cradle; his mother and Josephine were rocking him, and singing over him. Oh! it was a scene, I can tell you. My poor wife had been ill for some time, and was so weakened by it, that I frightened her into a fit, stealing a march on her that way. She fainted away. Perhaps it is as well she did; for I--I did not know what to think; it looked ugly; but while she lay at our feet insensible, I forced the truth from Rose; she owned the boy was hers."

While Raynal told him this strange story, Camille turned hot and cold.

First came a thrill of glowing joy; he had some clew to all this: he was a father; that child was Josephine's and his; the next moment he froze within. So Josephine had not only gulled her husband, but him, too; she had refused him the sad consolation of knowing he had a child. Cruelty, calculation, and baseness unexampled! Here was a creature who could sacrifice anything and anybody to her comfort, to the peace and sordid smoothness of her domestic life. She stood between two men--a thing.

Between two truths--a double lie.

His heart, in one moment, turned against her like a stone. A musket-bullet through the body does not turn life to death quicker than Raynal turned his rival's love to despair and scorn: that love which neither wounds, absence, prison, nor even her want of constancy had prevailed to shake.

"Out of my bosom!" he cried--"out of it, in this world and the next!"

He forgot, in his lofty rage, who stood beside him.

"What?--what?" cried Raynal.

"No matter," said Camille; "only I esteem YOU, Raynal. You are truth; you are a man, and deserve a better lot."

"Don't say that," replied Raynal, quite misunderstanding him. "It is a soldier's end: I never desired nor hoped a better: only, of course, I feel sad. You are a happy fellow, to have a child and to live to see it, and her you love."

"Oh, yes, I am very happy," replied the poor fellow, his lip quivering.

"Watch over all those poor women, comrade, and sometimes speak to them of me. It is foolish, but we like to be remembered."

"Yes! but do not let us speak of that. Raynal, you and I were lieutenants together; do you remember saving my life in the Arno?"

"Yes."

"Then promise me, if you should live, to remember not our quarrel of to-day, nor anything; but only those early days, AND THIS AFTERNOON."

"I do."

"Your hand, comrade."

"There, comrade, there."