“Then everything is all right. Thank you, Bénezech.”
The chaplain went out. Relapsing again into our somnolent state, we returned to our unappetising dish of vermicelli. As we were finishing, an orderly came in and handed a card to M. Gilbert.
“The officer,” he added, “insists on seeing you at once.”
M. Gilbert repeatedly looked at the card with the strained attention of a man who feels he is falling asleep.
“Oh! well,” he sighed; “show him in.”
And he added, turning towards us:
“Second Lieutenant David? Do you know him? You don’t?”
The Second Lieutenant was already at the door. Over his frizzly hair he wore the small cap distinctive of the light infantry. He had big lips, a faint, twisted moustache, the magnificent dark eyes of a Jewish trader, a hint of corpulence, short fat hands.
“Monsieur,” he said, “my battalion is going up the line, and I’m taking advantage of my passing here to get permission to see one of your patients—Lieutenant Limberg, a friend of mine.”
M. Gilbert, who had rather an expressive little nose, showed by a convulsive movement of that organ that he was much upset.