“That’s well. And now tell me, where did you learn to speak French so well?”
“From my tutor,” answered Pen.
“Your tutor! And you a simple soldier! Well, well! You English are full of surprises.”
Pen laughed.
“I suppose so,” he said; “but we are not alone in that.”
The French captain chatted a little longer, and then once more Pen was alone—alone but for the strange accompaniment of sounds incident to the night march: the neighing of horses, the scraps of quick talking which fell on his ear, along with that never-ceasing creak, rumble, and jolt of the wagons, a creaking and jolting which seemed to the tired brain as though they would go on for ever and ever.
He was aroused out of a strange waking dream, in which the past and the present were weirdly blended, by a voice which called him by name, and he tried to shake himself free from the tangle of confused thought which hemmed him in.
“Aren’t you there?” came the voice again.
“Yes, Punch, yes. What is it?”
“Ah, that’s all right! I wanted to tell you that I feel such a lot better.”