Presently another son of Madame de Clèves came in—an officer of dragoons in undress uniform, a splendid youth. He was the missing tenor, and made his excuses for being late, and sang very well indeed.
And Barty became the intimate friend of these good people, who made Blankenberghe a different place to him—and conceived for him a violent liking, and introduced him to all their smart Belgian friends; they were quite a set—bathing together, making music and dancing, taking excursions, and so forth. And before a fortnight was over Barty had become the most popular young man in the town, the gayest of the gay, the young guardsman once more, throwing dull care to the winds; and in spite of his impecuniosity (of which he made no secret whatever) the boute‑en‑train of the company. And this led to many droll adventures—of which I will tell one as a sample.
A certain Belgian viscount, who had a very pretty French wife, took a dislike to Barty. He had the reputation of being a tremendous fire‑eater. His wife, a light‑hearted little flirt (but with not much harm in her), took a great fancy to him, on the contrary.
One day she asked him for a wax impression of the seal‑ring he wore on his finger, and the following morning he sealed an empty envelope and stamped it with his ring, and handed it to her on the Plage. She snatched it with a quick gesture and slipped it into her pocket with quite a guilty little coquettish look of mutual understanding.
Monsieur Jean (as the viscount was called) noticed this, and jostled rudely against Josselin, who jostled back again and laughed.
Then the whole party walked off to the "tir," or shooting‑gallery on the Plage; some wager was on, I believe, and when they got there they all began to shoot—at different distances, ladies and gentlemen; all but Barty; it was a kind of handicap.
Monsieur Jean, after a fierce and significant look at Barty, slowly raised his pistol, took a deliberate aim at the small target, and fired—hitting it just half an inch over the bull's‑eye; a capital shot. Barty couldn't have done better himself. Then taking another loaded pistol, he presented it to my friend by the butt and said, with a solemn bow:
"À vous, monsieur de la garde."
"Messieurs de la garde doivent toujours tirer les premiers!" said Barty, laughing; and carelessly let off his pistol in the direction of the target without even taking aim. A little bell rang, and there was a shout of applause; and Barty was conscious that by an extraordinary fluke he had hit the bull's‑eye in the middle, and saw the situation at once.
Suddenly looking very grave and very sad, he threw the pistol away, and said: