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 near a criminal offence. Like all men without much imagination, which is such a help in the processes of reflective thought, Lieutenant D'Hubert became frightfully harassed by the obvious aspects of his predicament. He was certainly glad that he had not killed Lieutenant Feraud outside all rules and without the regular witnesses proper to such a transaction. Uncommonly glad. At the same time he felt as though he would have liked to wring his neck for him without ceremony.
He was still under the sway of these contradictory sentiments when the surgeon amateur of the flute came to see him. More than three days had elapsed. Lieutenant D'Hubert was no longer officier d'ordonnance to the general commanding the division. He had been sent back to his regiment. And he was resuming his connection with the soldiers' military family, by being shut up in close confinement not at his own quarters in town, but in a room in the barracks. Owing to the gravity of the incident, he was allowed to see no one. He did not know what had happened, what was being said or what was being thought. The arrival of the surgeon was a most unexpected event to the worried captive. The amateur of the flute began by explaining that he was there only by a special favour of the colonel who had thought fit to relax the general isolation order for this one occasion.
"I represented to him that it would be only fair to give you authentic news of your adversary," he continued. "You'll be glad to hear he's getting better fast."
Lieutenant D'Hubert's face exhibited no conventional signs of gladness. He continued to walk the floor of the dusty bare room.
"Take this chair, doctor," he mumbled.
The doctor sat down.
"This affair is variously appreciated in town and in the army. In fact the diversity of opinions is amusing."
"Is it?" mumbled Lieutenant D'Hubert, tramping steadily from wall to wall. But within himself he marvelled that there could be two opinions on the matter. The surgeon continued:
"Of course as the real facts are not known—"
"I should have thought," interrupted D'Hubert, "that the fellow would have put you in possession of the facts."
"He did say something," admitted the other, "the first time I saw him. And, by-the-bye, I did find him in the garden. The thump on the back of his head had made him a little incoherent then. Afterwards he was rather reticent than otherwise."
"Didn't think he would have the grace to be ashamed," grunted D'Hubert, who had stood still for a moment. He resumed his pacing while the doctor murmured.
"It's very amusing. Ashamed? Shame was not exactly his frame of mind. However, you may look at the matter otherwise——"
"What are you talking about? What matter?" asked D'Hubert with a sidelong look at the heavy-faced, gray-haired figure seated on a wooden chair.
"Whatever it is," said the surgeon, "I wouldn't pronounce an opinion on your conduct...."
"By heavens, you had better not," burst out D'Hubert.
"There! There! Don't be so quick in flourishing the sword. It doesn't pay in the long run. Understand once for all that I would not carve any of you youngsters except with the tools of my trade. But my advice is good. Moderate your temper. If you go on like this you will make for yourself an ugly reputation."
"Go on like what?" demanded Lieutenant D'Hubert, stopping short, quite startled. "I! I! make for myself a reputation.... What do you imagine——"
"I told you I don't wish to judge of the rights and wrongs of this incident. It's not my business. Nevertheless...."
"What on earth has he been telling you?" interrupted Lieutenant D'Hubert in a sort of awed scare.
"I told, you already that at first when I picked him up in the garden he was incoherent. Afterwards he was naturally reticent. But I gather at least that he could not help himself...."
"He couldn't?" shouted Lieutenant D'Hubert. Then lowering his voice, "And what about me? Could I help myself?"
The surgeon rose. His thoughts were running upon the flute, his constant companion, with a consoling voice. In the vicinity of field ambulances, after twenty-four hours' hard work, he had been known to trouble with its sweet sounds the horrible stillness of battlefields given over to silence and the dead. The solacing hour of his daily life was approaching and in peace time he held on to the minutes as a miser to his hoard.
"Of course! Of course!" he said perfunctorily. "You would think so. It's amusing. However, being perfectly neutral and friendly to you both, I have consented to deliver his message. Say that I am humouring an invalid if you like. He says that this affair is by no means at an end. He intends to send you his seconds directly he has regained his strength—providing, of course, the army is not in the field at that time."
"He intends—does he? Why certainly," spluttered Lieutenant D'Hubert passionately. The secret of this exasperation was not apparent to the visitor; but this passion confirmed him in the belief which was gaining ground outside that some very serious difference had arisen between these two young men. Something serious enough to wear an air of mystery. Some fact of the utmost gravity. To settle their urgent difference those two young men had risked being broken and disgraced at the outset, almost, of their career. And he feared that the forthcoming inquiry would fail to satisfy the public curiosity. They would not take the public into their confidence as to that something which had passed between them of a nature so outrageous as to make them face a charge of murder—neither more nor less. But what could it be?
The surgeon
