“We are on guard!”
“Peste!” laughed the officer grimly, as he looked at the old men one after the other in the face and added with cool deliberate cruelty: “Asleep on duty! Is this the manner of the Old Guard? No wonder, then, a Waterloo!”
By the gleam of the lantern I saw the grim old faces grow deadly pale, and almost shuddered at the look in the eyes of the old men as the laugh of the soldiers echoed the grim pleasantry of the officer.
I felt in that moment that I was in some measure avenged.
For a moment they looked as if they would throw themselves on the taunter, but years of their life had schooled them and they remained still.
“You are but five,” said the commissary; “where is the sixth?” The answer came with a grim chuckle.
“He is there!” and the speaker pointed to the bottom of the wardrobe. “He died last night. You won’t find much of him. The burial of the rats is quick!”
The commissary stooped and looked in. Then he turned to the officer and said calmly:
“We may as well go back. No trace here now; nothing to prove that man was the one wounded by your soldiers’ bullets! Probably they murdered him to cover up the trace. See!” again he stooped and placed his hands on the skeleton. “The rats work quickly and they are many. These bones are warm!”
I shuddered, and so did many more of those around me.