Look at
my hand, a saber-cut across the palm, to the bone, to save my head,
taken up with three stitches, and five days afterwards I was playing
ball with an English general, a prisoner in Madrid, against the wall of
the convent of the Santa Maria de la Castita! At Arcola, by the great
devil himself! that was an action. Every man there, gentlemen, swallowed
as much smoke in five minutes as would smother you all in this room! I
received, at the same moment, two musket balls in the thighs, a grape
shot through the calf of my leg, a lance through my left shoulder, a
piece of a shrapnel in the left deltoid, a bayonet through the cartilage
of my right ribs, a cut-cut that carried away a pound of flesh from my
chest, and the better part of a congreve rocket on my forehead. Pretty
well, ha, ha! and all while you'd say bah! and in eight days and a half
I was making a forced march, without shoes, and only one gaiter, the
life and soul of my company, and as sound as a roach!" "Bravo! Bravissimo! Per Bacco! un gallant' uomo!" exclaimed, in a
martial ecstasy, a fat little Italian, who manufactured toothpicks and
wicker cradles on the island of Notre Dame; "your exploits shall resound
through Europe! and the history of those wars should be written in your
blood!" "Never mind! a trifle!" exclaimed the soldier. "At Ligny, the other day,
where we smashed the Prussians into ten hundred thousand milliards of
atoms, a bit of a shell cut me across the leg and opened an artery. It
was spouting as high as the chimney, and in half a minute I had lost
enough to fill a pitcher. I must have expired in another minute, if I
had not whipped off my sash like a flash of lightning, tied it round my
leg above the wound, whipt a bayonet out of the back of a dead Prussian,
and passing it under, made a tourniquet of it with a couple of twists,
and so stayed the haemorrhage and saved my life. But, _sacrebleu_! gentlemen, I lost so much blood, I have been as pale as the bottom of a
plate ever since. No matter. A trifle. Blood well spent, gentlemen." He
applied himself now to his bottle of _vin ordinaire_. The Marquis had closed his eyes, and looked resigned and disgusted,
while all this was going on. "_Garçon_," said the officer, for the first time speaking in a low
tone over the back of his chair to the waiter; "who came in that
traveling carriage, dark yellow and black, that stands in the middle of
the yard, with arms and supporters emblazoned on the door, and a red
stork, as red as my facings?" The waiter could not say. The eye of the eccentric officer, who had suddenly grown grim and
serious, and seemed to have abandoned the general conversation to other
people, lighted, as it were accidentally, on me. "Pardon me, Monsieur," he said. "Did I not see you examining the panel
of that carriage at the same time that I did so, this evening? Can you
tell me who arrived in it?" "I rather think the Count and Countess de St. Alyre." "And are they here, in the Belle Étoile?" he asked. "They have got apartments upstairs," I answered. He started up, and half pushed his chair from the table. He quickly sat
down again, and I could hear him _sacré_-ing and muttering to
himself, and grinning and scowling. I could not tell whether he was
alarmed or furious. I turned to say a word or two to the Marquis, but he was gone. Several
other people had dropped out also, and the supper party soon broke up. Two or three substantial pieces of wood smoldered on the hearth, for the
night had turned out chilly. I sat down by the fire in a great armchair
of carved oak, with a marvelously high back that looked as old as the
days of Henry IV. "_Garçon_," said I, "do you happen to know who that officer is?" "That is Colonel Gaillarde, Monsieur." "Has he been often here?" "Once before, Monsieur, for a week; it is a year since." "He is the palest man I ever saw." "That is true, Monsieur; he has been often taken for a _revenant_." "Can you give me a bottle of really good Burgundy?" "The best in France, Monsieur." "Place it, and a glass by my side, on this table, if you please. I may
sit here for half-an-hour." "Certainly, Monsieur." I was very comfortable, the wine excellent, and my thoughts glowing and
serene. "Beautiful Countess! Beautiful Countess! shall we ever be better
acquainted?" Chapter VI

THE NAKED SWORD


A man who has been posting all day long, and changing the air he
breathes every half hour, who is well pleased with himself, and has
nothing on earth to trouble him, and who sits alone by a fire in a
comfortable chair after having eaten a hearty supper, may be pardoned
if he takes an accidental nap. I had filled my fourth glass when I fell asleep. My head, I daresay,
hung uncomfortably; and it is admitted that a variety of French dishes
is not the most favorable precursor to pleasant dreams. I had a dream as I took mine ease in mine inn on this occasion. I
fancied myself in a huge cathedral, without light, except from four
tapers that stood at the corners of a raised platform hung with black,
on which lay, draped also in black, what seemed to me the dead body of
the Countess de St. Alyre. The place seemed empty, it was cold, and I
could see only (in the halo of the candles) a little way round. The little I saw bore the character of Gothic gloom, and helped my fancy
to shape and furnish the black void that yawned all round me. I heard a
sound like the slow tread of two persons walking up the flagged aisle. A
faint echo told of the vastness of the place. An awful sense of
expectation was upon me, and I was horribly frightened when the body
that lay on the catafalque said (without stirring), in a whisper that
froze me, "They come to place me in the grave alive; save me." I found that I could neither speak nor move. I was horribly frightened. The two people who approached now emerged from the darkness. One, the
Count de St. Alyre, glided to the head of the figure and placed his long
thin hands under it. The white-faced Colonel, with the scar across his
face, and a look of infernal triumph, placed his hands under her feet,
and they began to raise her. With an indescribable effort I broke the spell that bound me, and
started to my feet with a gasp. I was wide awake, but the broad, wicked face of Colonel Gaillarde was
staring, white as death, at me from the other side of the hearth. "Where
is she?" I shuddered. "That depends on who she is, Monsieur," replied the Colonel, curtly. "Good heavens!" I gasped, looking about me. The Colonel, who was eyeing me sarcastically, had had his _demitasse_
of _café noir_, and now drank his _tasse_, diffusing a pleasant
perfume of brandy. "I fell asleep and was dreaming," I said, lest any strong language,
founded on the _rôle_ he played in my dream, should have escaped
me. "I did not know for some moments where I was." "You are the young gentleman who has the apartments over the Count and
Countess de St. Alyre?" he said, winking one eye, close in meditation,
and glaring at me with the other.