“I hope he didn’t make a pope.”

“No, he threw a plate at a man’s head.”

“Oh, that was hasty!”

“That’s not all.”

“That I can well imagine.”

“He fought a duel with that man.”

“And, most naturally, he killed him.”

“Exactly. Do you know why he did it?”

“No.”

The general shrugged his shoulders, and said: “Because the man said that I was a thief.” Then looking at Roland with an indefinable expression of raillery and affection, he added: “Ninny!” Then suddenly he burst out: “Oh! by the way, and the Englishman?”