“Of course we should be delighted, and exceedingly grateful to you. Do you mean it seriously? It would be cruel to joke on such a subject with men in our position.”
“I can assure you,” rejoined the stranger, “that I am thoroughly serious about the matter. What I propose to you is that you should enlist in the Dutch Army here. You know that the colonial troops receive a high rate of pay. The promotion is rapid, the duties are light; and although certificates of good conduct in the past are required, yet your face inspires me with such confidence, and your destitute appearance with such sympathy, that I am prepared to give the authorities the requisite guarantees in your behalf.”
Frederick quickly communicated the friendly offer to his companion, and after a few minutes' consultation, they decided on accepting it, with many thanks. It was indeed a perfect godsend for them, and it is impossible to say what would otherwise have been their fate.
Shortly before nightfall, and after providing the two men with a good square meal, the benevolent stranger accompanied them to the railway station, and took the train with them to “Meester Cornelis,” the great central depot and headquarters of the Dutch Army in the East. On arriving there, an hour later, he conducted them to the bureau of the chief recruiting officer. After undergoing examination by a regimental surgeon, who pronounced them physically fit for active service, they were duly enrolled as soldiers of a regiment of fusileers. Their friend, thereupon, having obtained a voucher from the recruiting officer, proceeded to the paymaster's bureau, where a sum of money was counted out to him on presentation of the document. Of this amount he handed fifty guilders to each of the two men, and then bade them adieu, and left them in charge of the sergeant who had piloted them through the barracks.
It is probable that neither Frederick nor his companion would have been so effusive in their protestations of gratitude toward the stranger, had they been aware of the fact at the time that he had appropriated to himself the major portion of the bounty of three hundred guilders which becomes the property of every European recruit who takes service in the Dutch Colonial Army.
The latter, which numbers some 27,000 men, is composed of men of almost every nationality. Germans and Swiss form the major portion of the foreign element, which comprises, however, many Russians, Frenchmen, Englishmen, and Americans. At least half of all these are men who have previously occupied a more elevated rank in life. Ruined clubmen, bankrupt merchants and traders, fugitive cashiers and dishonest clerks, and a large sprinkling of deserters from the various European armies, figure largely among the contingent. Among the corporals and simple privates are to be found men who have held even colonels' commissions in the Prussian and Austrian Armies, while once prominent but now ruined noblemen, such as the two Counts E——, of Berlin, and Prince R——, of Vienna, are to be seen figuring as mess-sergeants, and even as orderlies of half-educated and coarse Dutch infantry officers. Indeed, there is scarcely a foreigner in the Dutch Colonial Army who has not some sad or dark history attached to his name. Few of them ever return to their native land, for the climate of Java is deadly. It has been calculated that, of all the men who enlist, not more than thirty-five per cent. live through the whole period of their service. Of the 27,000 men who constitute the army, an average of at least 6,000 men are permanently on the sick list and hors de combat.
The name under which Frederick had been enrolled was Frederick Gavard, of Alsace, while his companion had described himself as Charles Renier, of Paris.
During the next three years Frederick and his fellow fugitive endured all the hardships of a soldier's life. Frederick had now learned how to control his former ungovernable temper, and had acquired the conviction that there is much more to be obtained by concealing one's real sentiments and by biding one's time than by any headstrong act of violence. Although he kept his hands free from crime during this period, yet it must not for one moment be gathered therefrom that his moral character had undergone any improvement. On the contrary, he was a far more dangerous character now than he had ever been before. It was but the absence of a suitable opportunity for making a profitable coup that prevented him from adding to his list of crimes.
By dint of the most careful observance of the regulations, by his remarkable intelligence, and by the evidences which he displayed of having undergone a most careful military training, he had succeeded in working his way up to the rank of sergeant. He was regarded with favor by his superiors and respected by his inferiors. Curiously enough he had kept himself free from any of those entanglements with native women which constitute the bane and shadow of a soldier's life in the East. At any rate, if he was engaged in intrigues of that kind they were kept secret from everybody.
The chief trial and annoyance to which he was subjected was the difficulty which he experienced in getting rid of Charles Renier, the companion of his flight from New Caledonia. The man was constantly getting into trouble and appealing to him for assistance and for money. Frederick dared not refuse him, as he was afraid that he would disclose his past history. Hardly a month elapsed without Charles being sentenced for some scrape or other to receive “twentig Rietslagen” (twenty blows from the terrible Malacca cane of the corporal), and he was on the high-road to terminate his military career by the “strop,” as the gallows is called out there. At length, catching sight one day of a corporal in the act of leaving the rooms inhabited by the dusky Mme. Renier for the time being, he threw himself upon him and thrashed him to within an inch of his life, showing thereby the superiority of the French “Savatte” over the Dutch “Boxie!” Indeed, he left the unfortunate man in a shocking condition, his jaw broken, and one of his ears partly torn from his head. Then, bursting into the woman's room, he seized the faithless damsel by the throat and kicked and pounded her into unconsciousness. After these exploits, well knowing that if caught he would probably be court-martialed and hanged, he deemed it prudent to show a pair of clean heels, and on the following morning his name was posted up as that of a deserter, and a reward was offered for his capture.