One or two muttered something—a good day, or the like. The rest grinned unmeaningly. Payton said nothing, but, folding his arms with a superior air, leant, frowning haughtily, against the wall.
"Parbleu," said Lemoine, as they rested. "It is a pity. The wrist is excellent, sare. But the pointing finger is not—is not!"
"I do my best," the Colonel answered, with cheerful resignation. "Shall we engage again?"
"At your pleasure."
The Frenchman's eye no longer twinkled; his gallantry was on its mettle. He was grave and severe, fixing his gaze on the Colonel's attack, and remaining blind to the nods and shrugs and smiles of amusement of his patrons in the background. Again he touched the Colonel, and, alas! again; with an ease which, good-natured as he was, he could not mask.
Colonel John, a little breathed, and perhaps a little chagrined also, dropped his point. Some one coughed, and another tittered.
"I think he will need another lesson or two," Payton remarked, speaking ostensibly to one of his companions, but loudly enough for all to hear.
The man whom he addressed made an inaudible answer. The Colonel turned towards them.
"And—a new hand," Payton added in the same tone.
Even for his henchman the remark was almost too much. But the Colonel, strange to say—perhaps he really was very simple—seemed to find nothing offensive in it. On the contrary, he replied to it.