III.--Under Another Flag
Cigarette was the pet of the army of Africa, and was as lawless as most of her patrons. She was the Friend of the Flag. Soldiers had been about her from her cradle. They had been her books, her teachers, her guardians, and, later on, her lovers, all the days of her life. She had no sense of duty taught her, except to face fire boldly, never to betray a comrade, and to worship but two deities--"la Gloire" and "la France." Her own sex would have seen no good in her, but her comrades-in-arms could, and did. A certain chasseur d'Afrique in this army at Algiers puzzled her. He treated her with a grave courtesy, that made her wish, with impatient scorn for the wish, that she knew how to read, and had not her hair cut short like a boy's--a weakness the little vivandière had never been visited with before.
"You are too fine for us, mon brave," she said pettishly once to this chasseur. "They say you are English, but I don't believe it. Say what you are, then?"
"A soldier of France. Can you wish me more?"
"True," she said simply. "But you were not always a soldier of France? You joined, they say, twelve years ago. What were you before then?"
"Before?" he answered slowly. "Well--a fool"
"You belonged to the majority, then!" said Cigarette. "But why did you come into the service? You were born in the noblesse--bah, I know an aristocrat at a glance! What ruined you, Monsieur l'Aristocrat?"
"Aristocrat? I am none. I am Louis Victor, a corporal of the chasseurs."
"You are dull, mon brave."
Cigarette left him, and made her way to the officers' quarters. High or low, they were all the same to Cigarette, and she would have talked to the emperor himself as coolly as she did to any private.