“I should rather say, to hasten thither at once,” said Frank. “I ought to report myself as soon as possible.”
“But you mustn't leave me, Dalton; I cannot part with you. À few hours is not much to you; to me it is a life long. I want you also to write to Walstein for me; he 'll take care to tell my mother.”
Frank knew well the breach of discipline this compliance would entail, and that he could scarcely be guilty of a graver offence against duty; but Ravitzky clung to his wish with such pertinacity, throwing into the entreaty all the eagerness of a last request, that Frank was obliged to promise he would remain, and let the result take what shape it might. While he, therefore, gave orders to his only unwounded comrade to hold himself in readiness to set out for Milan by daybreak, he proceeded to write the brief despatch which was to record his disaster. There are few sadder passages in the life of a young soldier than that in which he has to convey tidings of his own defeat. Want of success is so linked and bound up with want of merit, that every line, every word, seems a self-accusation.
However inevitable a mishap might appear to any witnessing it, a mere reader of the account might suggest fifty expedients to escape it. He knew, besides, the soldierlike contempt entertained in the service for all attacks of undisciplined forces, and how no party, however small, of “regulars” was esteemed insufficient to cope with a mob of peasants or villagers. Any contradiction to so acknowledged a theory would be received with loud reprobation, and, whatever came of it, the most inevitable result would be the professional ruin of him unlucky enough to incur such a failure.
“There's an end of the career of the Lieutenant von Dalton,” said Frank, as he concluded the paper. “Neither his uncle, the Field-Marshal, nor his sister, the Princess, will have favor enough to cover delinquency like this.” It did, indeed, seem a most humiliating avowal, and probably his own depressed state gave even a sadder coloring to the narrative. He accompanied this despatch by a few lines to the Count, his grand-uncle, which, if apologetic, were manly and straightforward; and, while bearing a high testimony to Ravitzky's conduct, took all the blame of failure to himself alone.
He would gladly have lain down to rest when this last was completed, but the cadet pressed eagerly for his services, and the letter to Walstein must be written at once.
“The surgeon tells me that there is internal bleeding,” said he, “and that, should it return with any degree of violence, all chance of recovery is hopeless. Let us look the danger boldly in the face, then, Dalton; and, while I have the time, let me tell Walstein all that I have learned since we parted. The letter I will confide to your safe keeping till such time as it can be forwarded without risk of discovery.”
“Is there necessity for such precaution?” asked Frank.
“Can you ask me the question?”
“Then how am I to write it?” said he.