VII
Followed upon the blow a sputtering oath from de Moulny, succeeded by a buzzing as of swarming hornets, as the various groups scattered over the exercise-ground broke up and consolidated into a crowd. Hector and de Moulny, as the nucleus of the said crowd, were deafened by interrogations, suffocated by the smell of red and blue dye, perspiration and pomatum, choked by the dense dust kicked up by thick, wooden-heeled, iron toe-capped shoes (each pupil blacked his own, not neglecting the soles—at cockcrow every morning)—jostled, squeezed, hustled and mobbed by immature personalities destined to be potential by-and-by in the remolding of a New France,—the said personalities being contained in baggy red breeches and coarse blue, black-belted blouses. All the eyes belonging to all the faces under the high-crowned, shiny-peaked caps of undress-wear, faces thin, faces fleshy, faces pimply, faces high-colored or pale—were round and staring with curiosity. The Redskin had challenged de Moulny! But de Moulny was his superior officer! The quarrel was about a woman. Sacred name of a pipe! Where was the affair to come off? In the Salle de Danse?—empty save at the State-appointed periods of agility occurring on two days in the week. In the yard behind the Department of Chemistry? That was a good place!
Meanwhile a duologue took place between the challenged and the challenger, unheard in the general hubbub. Said de Moulny, blotchily pale excepting for the crimson patch upon one well-padded cheekbone, for his madness was dying out in him, and he was beginning to realize the thing that he had done:
“What I have said is true: upon my honor! I heard it from my father. Or, to be more correct, I heard my father tell the story to M. de Beyras, the Minister of Finance, and General d’Arville at the dinner-table only last night.” He added: “My grandmother and the other ladies had withdrawn. I had dined with them—it being Wednesday. Perhaps they forgot me, or thought I was too deep in the dessert to care what they said. But if my mouth was stuffed with strawberries and cream, and peaches and bonbons, my ears were empty, and I heard all I wanted to hear.”
The crowd was listening now with all its ears. That image of de Moulny gormandizing tickled its sense of fun. There was a general giggle, and the corners of the mouths went up as though pulled by one string. De Moulny, sickening more and more at his task of explanation, went on, fumbling at his belt:
“As to remembering, that is very easy. Read me a page of a book, or a column of a newspaper twice—I will recite it you without an error, as you are very well aware. I will repeat you this that I heard in private, if you prefer it?”
Hector, between his small square teeth, said—the opposite of what he longed to say.... “There can be no privacy in a place like this. I prefer that you should speak out, openly, before all here!”
There was a silence about the boys, broken only by a horse-laugh or two, a whinnying giggle. The piled-up faces all about, save one or two, were grave and attentive, the hands, clean or dirty, generally dirty, by which the listeners upon the outer circle of the interested crowd supported themselves upon the shoulders of those who stood in front of them, unconsciously tightened their grip as de Moulny went on, slowly and laboriously, as though repeating an imposition, while the red mark upon his cheek deepened to blackish blue:
“How Marshal Dunoisse originally prevailed upon Sister Térèse de Saint François, of the Carmelite Convent of Widinitz in Southern Bavaria, to break her vows for him, I have no idea. I am only repeating what I have heard, and I did not hear that. He went through a kind of ceremony with her before a Protestant pastor in Switzerland; and three years subsequently to the birth of their son, induced a French Catholic priest, ignorant, of course, that the lady was a Religious,—to administer the Sacrament of Marriage.” De Moulny stopped to lick his dry lips, and pursued: “By that ceremony you were made legitimate, per subsequens matrimonium, according to Canon Law.” He syllabled the Latin as conscientiously as a sacristan’s parrot might have done. “There is no doubt of the truth of all this; my father said it to M. de Beyras and the General, and what my father says is so—he never speaks without being sure!”
Hector knew a pang of envy of this boy who owned a father capable of inspiring a confidence so immense. But he never took his eyes from those slowly moving lips of de Moulny’s, as the words came dropping out....