Fin Tireur | Page 4

we are sitting now, and little Marie was playing just outside by
the well, so that I could see her through the window. By the sounds, I
knew a great caravan was coming up, and passing towards the south.
They always water at the well, and I stood by the window to see them.

Little Marie stood too, shading her eyes with her bit of a hand. The
drums and pipes got louder, and round the corner of the inn came as big
a caravan as I've ever seen; near a hundred camels, horsemen, and led
mules and donkeys, Kabyle dogs and goats, the music playing all the
time, and a Caïd's flag flying in the front. They made for the well, as I
knew they would, and little Marie stood all the while watching them.
M'sieu, there were square packs on some of the camels, and veiled
women on the packs."
He looked across at me hard.
"Veiled women?" I repeated.
"When they got to the well they made the camels kneel for the women
to get down; and one of the women, when she was down, caught sight
of Marie standing there, with her little hand shading her eyes. That
woman gave a great cry behind her veil. I heard it, m'sieu, as I stood by
the window there, and I saw the woman run at the little one."
He got up from his seat slowly, and stood by the wooden shutter,
against which the sand was driven by the wind.
"In a place like this, m'sieu, one keeps a revolver here."
He put his hand to a pocket at the back of his breeches, brought out a
revolver, and pointed it at the shutter.
"When I heard the woman cry I took my revolver out. When I saw the
woman run I fired, and the bullet struck the veil."
He put the revolver back into his pocket, and sat down again quietly.
"And that's why they call me Fin Tireur."
I said nothing, and sat staring at him.
"When the camels had been watered the caravan went on."
"But--but the Arabs------"

"The Caïd had the body tied across a donkey--they told me."
"You didn't see?"
"No. I took the little one in. She was screaming, and I had to see to her.
It was two days afterwards, when I was at the market, that a scorpion
stung her. She was dead when I came back. Well, m'sieu, are you sorry
you ate your supper?"
Before I could reply, the door opening into the courtyard gaped, and the
driver entered, followed by a cloud of whirling sand grains.
"Nom d'un chien!" he exclaimed. "Get me a tumbler of wine, for the
love of God, Fin Tireur. My throat's full of the sand. Sacré nom d'un
nom d'un nom!"
He pulled off his coat, turned it upside down, and shook the sand out of
the pockets, while Fin Tireur went over to the corner of the kitchen
where the bottles stood in a row against the earthen wall.

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