Unfortunately at that moment one of the troopers struck a match and lit a candle. This only added to the fellow's drunken fury, and to our horror we saw him pull a huge clasp-knife from one of his pockets. We all sprang to our feet, but the drunken man, selecting a trooper against whom he evidently had a grudge, made a rush for him; at the same time the candle was upset, and in the dark we could hear the two men struggling and rushing about the cell. "Who has got a match?" I shouted. As ill luck would have it, nobody could find one for the moment, so, unwilling to be ripped open in the dark, I groped my way towards a recess where "jules" stood, and closed the door behind me. A few minutes, perhaps but a few seconds, later I heard Piatte's deep bass voice saying, "No you don't, my children, no you don't!" I carefully peeped out, slightly opening the door. The candle had been re-lighted, and in the middle of the cells stood Piatte, in uniform, holding two men, one by his coat-collar, and the other by the wrist. It appears that Piatte had returned to barracks drunk that night, and had been taken to the lock-up, but, being in a very quiet mood when "boozed," he had merely gone to lie down in a corner. He had been aroused by the noise of the fight, and had immediately jumped up to separate the belligerents. It was dark when he first tackled them, and in the struggle he had been stabbed through the arm. In the meantime some one had found a match and re-lighted the candle just as I emerged from my place of safety. It was superb to see the Hercules Piatte holding these two men, absolutely frenzied as they were, as easily as if they had been mere babies. "Put down your knives, you beggars," he said to them, and as the man who had begun the row, and whose wrist he held, swore that he would do no such thing, but that he would soon have his knife through Piatte's digestive organs, the latter gave a wrench to his wrist which made the weapon drop to the ground. Some of us had in the meantime disarmed the other fellow, and Piatte then addressed them:
"Are you going to be quiet and go to sleep, you silly beggars?"
A torrent of abuse was the only reply, and the two combatants continued to swear they would have one another's blood.
"Very well!" said Piatte. "If you are so anxious to knock each other about here goes!" and so saying, he banged the two men one against the other half a dozen times as if they had been mere puppets. He then let them go. "Got enough of it, my boys?" he asked grimly.
They had apparently had quite enough of it, for they both went to lie down moaning heavily. Curiously enough, neither of them had been stabbed, and they had only received some insignificant scratches. Beckoning to Piatte to come to me, I examined his wound; luckily for him he was wearing his uniform coat, and the thickness of the cloth had partly stopped the knife, and it had only penetrated slightly into the flesh of his arm. It was with difficulty that I induced him to let me bind it up with my pocket handkerchief, a trifling service which the kind-hearted fellow never forgot, and which he repaid in more ways than one. When the Sergeant of the Guard came at 3 A.M. to take the men to the pump, I was ordered to stop in the cells, the Sergeant having received special instructions to keep me there until the Major turned up in the morning. There were two prisoners to keep me company, but dog-tired as I was, I soon dropped off to sleep, and did not awake till half-past six, when my friend de Lanoy came to look me up. He had tried to find out what I was charged with, but had failed to do so; he promised, however, to come and let me know as soon as he obtained any information, so that I should be prepared to face the Major, before whom I was to be brought at 10 A.M. De Lanoy also kindly suggested sending me my washing materials and a razor, in order that I should not look the disgraceful object I then did. Shortly afterwards the Corporal of the Guard brought me my things, as well as a bucket and a looking-glass, and while I was making my toilet he chattered with me about my case.
"You're in a nice hole, old boy," he said, "and I shouldn't like to stand in your shoes. What on earth have you been doing?"
I assured him that this was the very thing I did not know myself.
"Now that is all rot," he replied. "It must have been something, jolly serious, too, for when the Major came to the barracks yesterday he was in a greater rage than I have ever seen him in before. Yes," he went on, "I really thought he would have had a fit."
I once more renewed my assurance that I was absolutely unconscious of having done anything wrong.
"Get along with you," said the Corporal; "you won't get me to believe that, but if you choose to keep it to yourself, do so, by all means, I don't care." He then took my things away, and I was soon left to my own thoughts, the two prisoners being taken out to do work. At 9 o'clock de Lanoy returned, and told me that so far all he knew was that I had been given four days' Salle de Police by the Lieutenant who had given me ten o'clock leave the previous day. At 10.30 A.M. the door of the cells once more opened, and the Corporal of the Guard ordered me to step out, whereupon I was marched off between two of the troopers of the guard, who, with drawn swords, escorted me as far as the Salle de Rapport. The Adjudant soon came to the door and ordered me to walk in, stepping out himself at the same time, and closing the door behind him. The room was a spacious one, with a large table in the middle of it, at which a small bald-headed man sat signing documents; his back was turned to me whilst I stood near the door at attention. After a few minutes' silence, only interrupted by the grating of his pen upon the paper, the little man, without turning round, called out: