"Ah, that is different! I am a lonely man, and a servant in the way of his duty. Nothing can come amiss to me. Even if either side fortifies the junction buildings—why, I am the station-master acting for the Company. I sit and write my report once a day, and for the rest I read Hugo. Nothing is more simple. But as for you, take an old man's word. You are better anywhere than where you are!"
CHAPTER XXVII
UNDER WHICH KING, BEZONIAN?
The station-master was right. I saw how things were tending and how the revolt was sure to end. Yet I was by nature so curious of the oddities of the business that I put off speaking to Keller Bey. For one thing, I did not want to find myself shut up in the Duke's Castle along with the other martyrs of the new rule. I preferred the open air and risk. Besides, I could each day assure myself of the well-being of Dennis Deventer and his family.
I discovered where Jack Jaikes was usually to be found on guard, and, early in the dusk of the morning, I slipped from my room in order to speak half an hour with him in private. He first abused me like a pickpocket for taking sides with such a dirty pack, and it was with the utmost difficulty that he could be persuaded that there was after all a difference between a Communard and a prisoner on parole. He did not trouble to conceal his opinion of the latter.
"Jump over the wall," he whispered, "see, catch hold of my belt. I tell ye, man, in business we cannot afford to be so fine. I learned that in Glasgow long syne, when a brither-in-law o' mine took my job from me. Now, he was my brither, though not by blood, and in a manner o' speaking I had promised to love, honour, and obey. But instead I just bashed him till he was laid up in bed for six weeks—so I got my job back! Now tell me, where would I have been if I had minded about honour and 'paroles' and them things?"
It was in vain that I pointed out to Jack Jaikes that, after all, it was not he but his sister who had promised to love, honour, and obey the maltreated job-jumper.
"It doesna maitter. It's all the wan thing!" was all that I could get out of Jack Jaikes. "Now then, catch a haud and I'll hae ye beside me in the crack o' a cow's tail!"
Now, though I had fought duels on the sly at St. André on the most approved principles of French honour, I had done so chiefly because I possessed an excellent method and a supple wrist trained by years of the "Salle." Really I cared nothing about any artificial code of honour. But it was quite a different thing to have passed my word to Keller Bey, and entirely unthinkable to leave him in the lurch by making my escape without telling him.