"Plenty of money to waste, eh? Regimentals not good enough for you? I suppose you would consider yourself degraded if you had to wear a regimental shirt? Linen's too coarse for a tender skin like yours, eh?"
I thought it as well to make no reply. Lifting up my blouse, the Lieutenant then looked at my shirt, and told me to unbutton it. I was wearing under my flannel shirt an under-vest made of wool and spun silk.
"Ah! just what I thought," again remarked the Lieutenant. "The thing must wear flannel and silk like a Cocotte (a fast woman), and then calls itself a trooper. I don't wear any undervests, and yet I'm an officer! Well," he added, as he passed on to the next bed, "you've already found out that silk vests won't prevent you from going to the Salle de Police. You've got nothing missing to-day, but I'll soon catch you napping. You won't pass many inspections without having to send you to the Boite. Silk vests indeed!" he kept on muttering.
He then began to examine Titi's bed. After looking through his outfit he lifted up the mattress, and found underneath it a dirty pair of drawers and a newspaper. "Just as I expected," he remarked. "What's that?" he asked, showing the newspaper to Titi.
"Oh, it's an old newspaper, sir," blandly replied Titi, "that I put aside. I bought some things in the town and they were wrapped up in it."
The Lieutenant looked at the date of the paper; it was the previous day's number of a Radical journal.
"So, we read the paper here; the vilest rag, too, that was ever printed. Well, you will see what it will cost you, you dirty Communard. To begin with, you'll have eight days' Salle de Police, and I shall specially report you." So saying, the Lieutenant, holding the paper by the tips of his fingers, at arm's length, as if it had been something likely to contaminate him, handed it over to the Sergeant, de Lanoy, ordering him to go and throw that "vermin" on the dung-heap. "De Lanoy," he added, "on your way stop at the Sergeant-major's office and tell him to put you down for two days' Salle de Police for the disgusting state in which your peloton is kept."
As the Lieutenant was looking over the last trooper's outfit our Captain came into the room. The Lieutenant went and spoke to him, and they both returned towards Titi's bed.
"So, Martin," said the Captain in a great rage, "you dare to read papers in the barracks,[35] and as you are now undergoing eight days' Salle de Police you cannot possibly have brought it in yourself. I want to know from whom you got it?"