"Embrace me, my old Castillon," replied the latter, with unrestrained warmth. "I find you still as I left you, the best of men."
Lebrenn and his former foreman continued their conversation to one side, in low tones, while Duchemin said to Martin, who was studying his face as if seeking to trace a resemblance:
"You don't recognize me, captain?"
"It seems to me I have seen you——" replied Martin dubiously.
"That blasted sun of Egypt has spoiled my complexion, else you'd remember Duchemin, once cannonier in the Army of the Rhine and Moselle, where we served together."
"Aye, now I remember you, old comrade," cried the artist, seizing the other's hand. "And how is Carmagnole—and Reddy?" he added with a grin.
"My poor Reddy—he went the way of Double-grey," sighed the artillerist. "He died like a brave war-horse. He received a ball in the body at the battle of Altenkirchen. As to Carmagnole, my sweetheart of a spit-fire, she split laughing, my pretty piece, while sending a triple charge of grape-shot into the Austrians. After which, widowed of my Carmagnole, I set out for the Orient."
"And so you went through the campaign in Egypt?"
"Bad luck to it, yes! A devil of a war! And Bonaparte!—Twist his noose without drum or trumpet! To leave the army in the lurch! Name of names, what cries, what shouts there were against the 'Little Corporal,' when it became known he had abandoned us. Had we caught him, we'd have tied his necktie for him!"
"You left Egypt, then, after him?"