The scene around us added color to his words. The moonlight fell on ghostly groups of men seated before the camp-fires, their faces glowing in the red light of the ashes; on the irregular rows of thatched shelters and on the shadowy figures of the ponies grazing at the picket-line. All the odors of a camp, which to me are more grateful than those of a garden, were borne to us on the damp night-air; the clean pungent smell of burning wood, the scent of running water, the smell of many horses crowded together and of wet saddles and accoutrements. And above the swift rush of the stream, we could hear the ceaseless pounding of the horses’ hoofs on the turf, the murmurs of the men’s voices, and the lonely cry of the night-birds.
It was past midnight when the General rose, and my brain rioted with the pictures he had drawn for me. Surely, if I had ever considered turning back, I now no longer tolerated the thought of it. If he had wished to convince me that the life of a soldier of fortune was an ungrateful one he had set about proving it in the worst possible way. At that moment I saw no career so worthy to be imitated as his own, no success to be so envied as his failures. And in the glow and inspiration of his talk, and with the courage of a boy, I told him so. I think he was not ill pleased at what I said, nor with me. He seemed to approve of what I had related of myself, and of the comments I had made upon his reminiscences. He had said, again and again: “That is an intelligent question,” “You have put your finger on the real weakness of the attack,” “That was exactly the error in his strategy.”
When he turned to enter his tent he shook my hand. “I do not know when I have talked so much,” he laughed, “nor,” he added, with grave courtesy, “when I have had so intelligent a listener. Good-night.”
Throughout the evening he had been holding my sword, and as he entered the tent he handed it to me.
“Oh, I forgot,” he said. “Here is your sword, Captain.”
The flaps of the tent fell behind him, and I was left outside of them, incredulous and trembling.
I could not restrain myself, and I pushed the flaps aside.
“I beg your pardon, General,” I stammered.
He had already thrown himself upon his cot, but he rose on his elbow and stared at me.
“What is it?” he demanded.