"The boys.... Then I shall not know the boys?"
"No, Monseigneur, except by hearsay. The Professor will tell you their names, ages, and—ah!—leading characteristics.... You will learn with them, and every week you will write a composition with them, recapitulating what you have learned. And that they will hear of you goes without saying. Frequently, Monseigneur, but frequently!"
His pupil interrupted:
"They will hear of me, but what is that? They will never see me—I shall never see them! Never join in their games—never be just another boy with them! Never be friends or foes with them—never beat them or be—— No! I should not like to be beaten at all!"
M. le Général rejoined solemnly:
"That degrading possibility, and graver dangers still, will be averted by the fact that their Imperial schoolfellow will not be—ah!—bodily present in their midst, my Prince. Perhaps your Imperial Highness would like to see the Professor now?"
And so the Professor came, and from him the boy eagerly gleaned information about his little schoolfellows of the Seventh Form. He had friends of his own who came to him after High Mass on Sundays and on all holidays. But except Espinasse, they had been chosen for him. The joy of selection and choice he was not to know.
Thus, many men of mark from different Lycées succeeded one another in the work-room at the Château and successively occupied the arm-chair at the end of the leather-covered table in one of the three windows of his corner study on the third story of the Pavilion de Flore at the Tuileries—and when he had been attentive and pleased his Professor,—his reward would be to hear about the boys.... Some were noble, splendid fellows, full of cleverness, energy and spirits; others were funny by reason of sheer stupidity, or some quaint characteristic or absurd failing which had gained them nicknames among the rest. A few were spoken of almost with reverence, as being dowered with the magical gift of genius: poets, dramatists, novelists, scientists in embryo, budding naval or military commanders, explorers who were to plant the Flag of France in virgin corners of the earth and proudly add them to the Empire that would one day be his own....
He met his longed-for boys at last. One likes to picture him—having once taken a First Place in the Arithmetic Class—as being permitted to join in the St. Charlemagne fête of the Lycée Bonaparte. He sat in the center of one of the long tables, with long vistas of boys, boys, boys opening out before him whichever way he turned his head. And he was happy, but for this thing; that though most of the boys in whom he had been particularly interested were presented to him, he did not find—as secretly he hoped to find—the friend of whom he dreamed....
He tried to be bon camarade; to combine—and he had a special gift in this—easy good-fellowship with graciousness. But the boys did not respond as he would have liked. They stood to attention, and looked him in the face, and answered, "Yes, Monseigneur! No, Monseigneur!" boldly, or they shuffled and blinked, and answered, "No, Monseigneur! Yes, Monseigneur!" mumblingly, and that was all.