a very bad wound.”
“So much the better,” replied Louis; “I can kill him.”
“But suppose he kills you?”
“I’d rather that than bear his blow.”
Bonaparte made no further objections; he loved courage, instinctively, and his young comrade’s pleased him.
“Well, so be it!” he replied; “I will tell Valence that you wish to fight him, but not till to-morrow.”
“Why to-morrow?”
“You will have the night to reflect.”
“And from now till to-morrow,” replied the child, “Valence will think me a coward.” Then shaking his head, “It is too long till to-morrow.” And he walked away.
“Where are you going?” Bonaparte asked him.
“To ask some one else to be my friend.”
“So I am no longer your friend?”
“No, since you think I am a coward.”
“Very well,” said the young man rising.
“You will go?”
“I am going.”
“At once?”
“At once.”
“Ah!” exclaimed the child, “I beg your pardon; you are indeed my friend.” And he fell upon his neck weeping. They were the first tears he had shed since he had received the blow.
Bonaparte went in search of Valence and gravely explained his mission to him. Valence was a tall lad of seventeen, having already, like certain precocious natures, a beard and mustache; he appeared at least twenty. He was, moreover, a head taller than the boy he had insulted.
Valence replied that Louis had pulled his queue as if it were a bell-cord (queues were then in vogue) – that he had warned him twice to desist, but that Louis had repeated the prank the third time, whereupon, considering him a mischievous youngster, he had treated him as such.
Valence’s answer was reported to Louis, who retorted that pulling a comrade’s queue was only teasing him, whereas a blow was an insult. Obstinacy endowed this child of thirteen with the logic of a man of thirty.
The modern Popilius to Valence returned with his declaration of war. The youth was greatly embarrassed; he could not fight with a child without being ridiculous. If he fought and wounded him, it would be a horrible thing; if he himself were wounded, he would never get over it so long as he lived.
But Louis’s unyielding obstinacy made the matter a serious one. A council of the Grands (elder scholars) was called, as was usual in serious cases. The Grands decided that one of their number could not fight a child; but since this child persisted in considering himself a young man, Valence must tell him before all his schoolmates that he regretted having treated him as a child, and would henceforth regard him as a young man.
Louis, who was waiting in his friend’s room, was sent for. He was introduced into the conclave assembled in the playground of the younger pupils.
There Valence, to whom his comrades had dictated a speech carefully debated among themselves to safeguard the honor of the Grands toward the Petits, assured Louis that he deeply deplored the occurrence; that he had treated him according to his age and not according to his intelligence and courage, and begged him to excuse his impatience and to shake hands in sign that all was forgotten.
But Louis shook his head.
“I heard my father, who is a colonel, say once,” he replied, “that he who receives a blow and does not fight is a coward. The first time I see my father I shall ask him if he who strikes the blow and then apologizes to avoid fighting is not more of a coward than he who received it.”
The young fellows looked at each other. Still the general opinion was against a duel which would resemble murder, and all, Bonaparte included, were unanimously agreed that the child must be satisfied with what Valence had said, for it represented their common opinion. Louis retired, pale with anger, and sulked with his great friend, who, said he, with imperturbable gravity, had sacrificed his honor.
The morrow, while the Grands were receiving their lesson in mathematics, Louis slipped into the recitation-room, and while Valence was making a demonstration on the blackboard, he approached him unperceived, climbed on a stool to reach his face, and returned the slap he had received the preceding day.
“There,” said he, “now we are quits, and I have your apologies to boot; as for me, I shan’t make any, you may be quite sure of that.”
The scandal was great. The act occurring in the professor’s presence, he was obliged to report it to the governor of the school, the Marquis Tiburce Valence. The latter, knowing nothing of the events leading up to the blow his nephew had received, sent for the delinquent and after a terrible lecture informed him that he was no longer a member of the school, and must be ready to return to his mother at Bourg that very day. Louis replied that his things would be packed in ten minutes, and he out of the school in fifteen. Of the blow he himself had received he said not a word.
The reply seemed more than disrespectful to the Marquis Tiburce Valence. He was much inclined to send the insolent boy to the dungeon for a week, but reflected that he could not confine him and expel him at the same time.
The child was placed in charge of an attendant, who was not to leave him until he had put him in the coach for Mâcon; Madame de Montrevel was to be notified to meet him at the end of the journey.
Bonaparte meeting the boy, followed by his keeper, asked an explanation of the sort of constabulary guard attached to him.
“I’d tell you if you were still my friend,” replied the child; “but you are not. Why do you bother about what happens to me, whether good or bad?”
Bonaparte made a sign to the attendant, who came to the door while Louis was packing his little trunk. He learned then that the child had been expelled. The step was serious; it would distress the entire family, and perhaps ruin his young comrade’s future.
With that rapidity of decision which was one of the distinctive characteristics of his organization, he resolved to ask an audience of the governor, meantime requesting the keeper not to hasten Louis’s departure.
Bonaparte was an excellent pupil, beloved in the school, and highly esteemed by the Marquis Tiburce Valence. His request was immediately complied with. Ushered into the governor’s presence, he related everything, and, without blaming Valence in the least, he sought to exculpate Louis.
“Are you sure of what you are telling me, sir?” asked the governor.
“Question your nephew himself. I will abide by what he says.”
Valence was sent for. He had already heard of Louis’s expulsion, and was on his way to tell his uncle what had happened. His account tallied perfectly with what you Bonaparte had said.
“Very well,” said the governor, “Louis shall not go, but you will. You are old enough to leave school.” Then ringing, “Bring me the list of the vacant sub-lieutenancies,” he said.
That same day an urgent request for a sub-lieutenancy was made to the Ministry, and that same
