The Point Of Honor | Page 8

kind. On the contrary, her incoherent intentions were to remain in the garden and fight with her nails and her teeth for the protection of the prostrate man. This was horrible.
"My dear child," he cried in despair, "is it possible that you think me capable of murdering a wounded adversary? Is it.... Be quiet, you little wildcat, you," he added.
She struggled. A thick sleepy voice said behind him:
"What are you up to with that girl?"
Lieutenant Feraud had raised himself on his good arm. He was looking sleepily at his other arm, at the mess of blood on his uniform, at a small red pool on the ground, at his sabre lying a foot away on the path. Then he laid himself down gently again to think it all out as far as a thundering headache would permit of mental operations.
Lieutenant D'Hubert released the girl's wrists. She flew away down the path and crouched wildly by the side of the vanquished warrior. The shades of night were falling on the little trim garden with this touching group whence proceeded low murmurs of sorrow and compassion with other feeble sounds of a different character as if an imperfectly awake invalid were trying to swear. Lieutenant D'Hubert went away, too exasperated to care what would happen.
He passed through the silent house and congratulated himself upon the dusk concealing his gory hands and scratched face from the passers-by. But this story could by no means be concealed. He dreaded the discredit and ridicule above everything, and was painfully aware of sneaking through the back streets to his quarters. In one of these quiet side streets the sounds of a flute coming out of the open window of a lighted upstairs room in a modest house interrupted his dismal reflections. It was being played with a deliberate, persevering virtuosity, and through the fioritures of the tune one could even hear the thump of the foot beating time on the floor.
Lieutenant D'Hubert shouted a name which was that of an army surgeon whom he knew fairly well. The sounds of the flute ceased and the musician appeared at the window, his instrument still in his hand, peering into the street.
"Who calls? You, D'Hubert! What brings you this way?"
He did not like to be disturbed when he was playing the flute. He was a man whose hair had turned gray already in the thankless task of tying up wounds on battlefields where others reaped advancement and glory.
"I want you to go at once and see Feraud. You know Lieutenant Feraud? He lives down the second street. It's but a step from here."
"What's the matter with him?"
"Wounded."
"Are you sure?"
"Sure!" cried D'Hubert. "I come from there."
"That's amusing," said the elderly surgeon. Amusing was his favourite word; but the expression of his face when he pronounced it never corresponded. He was a stolid man. "Come in," he added. "I'll get ready in a moment."
"Thanks. I will. I want to wash my hands in your room."
Lieutenant D'Hubert found the surgeon occupied in unscrewing his flute and packing the pieces methodically in a velvet-lined case. He turned his head.
"Water there--in the corner. Your hands do want washing."
"I've stopped the bleeding," said Lieutenant D'Hubert. "But you had better make haste. It's rather more than ten minutes ago, you know."
The surgeon did not hurry his movements.
"What's the matter? Dressing came off? That's amusing. I've been busy in the hospital all day, but somebody has told me that he hadn't a scratch."
"Not the same duel probably," growled moodily Lieutenant D'Hubert, wiping his hands on a coarse towel.
"Not the same.... What? Another? It would take the very devil to make me go out twice in one day." He looked narrowly at Lieutenant D'Hubert. "How did you come by that scratched face? Both sides too--and symmetrical. It's amusing."
"Very," snarled Lieutenant D'Hubert. "And you will find his slashed arm amusing too. It will keep both of you amused for quite a long time."
The doctor was mystified and impressed by the brusque bitterness of Lieutenant D'Hubert's tone. They left the house together, and in the street he was still more mystified by his conduct.
"Aren't you coming with me?" he asked.
"No," said Lieutenant D'Hubert. "You can find the house by yourself. The front door will be open very likely."
"All right. Where's his room?"
"Ground floor. But you had better go right through and look in the garden first."
This astonishing piece of information made the surgeon go off without further parley. Lieutenant D'Hubert regained his quarters nursing a hot and uneasy indignation. He dreaded the chaff of his comrades almost as much as the anger of his superiors. He felt as though he had been entrapped into a damaging exposure. The truth was confoundedly grotesque and embarrassing to justify; putting aside the irregularity of the combat itself which made it come dangerously