The captain grunted, and put his case back with a suppressed sigh. He had not known, but hoped. Then he waited for a reply to his leading and ambiguous remark.
'Yes,' mused Hicks at length; 'he is. I dined with him the night he left for the Servian frontier.'
This detail, interesting as it was, had but slight reference to the general characteristics of Theodore Trist. Huston tried again after he had lighted his cigar.
'One never knows where one has him.'
Hicks looked mildly sympathetic. He even gave the impression of being about to look in his pockets on the chance of finding the war-correspondent there.
'No; he is always on the move. I was once told that the Diplomatic Corps call him the Stormy Petrel, because he arrives before the hurricane.'
'And sits smiling on the top of the waves afterwards, while we poor devils sink,' added the soldier with a disagreeable laugh.
'He has not the reputation of being a coward,' said Hicks, who despised personal courage as a mere brute-like attribute.
The man of arms did not like the turn of the conversation.
'No; I believe not,' he said rather hurriedly, as if no man could be a coward. 'What I don't like about him is a certain air of mystery which he cultivates. It pleases the women, I suppose.'