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For The Honor Of France
by
“‘Save yourselves, I will make the guns safe,’ he cried to his men–he was not all a coward, poor fellow–and as they ran for it he picked up the spikes and the hammer. Tap! tap! tap! one gun was spiked. Tap! tap! tap! another. Then we heard the Russians beginning to scramble up outside.
“He swore a great oath as he dropped the hammer. ‘It can’t be done. Run, cat!’ he cried–and away he started after his men. The name that I called him as he ran away, Monsieur, was a very foul name; God forgive me for what I said! But I was determined that it should be done. In a second I had picked up the nails and the hammer, and–tap! tap! tap!–the third gun was safe. ‘Run, cat!’ I heard the lieutenant call again. But–tap!–I had the nail started in the last gun, and then, right above me, was a Russian major and with him a dozen of his men. Tap! and I had the nail half-way home as the major jumped down beside me, with his sword raised. I knew that I could parry his blow with the hammer and then, possibly, get away; but I wanted to make sure that that gun could not be turned. And so–it was quick thinking that I did just then, Monsieur–tap! and the gun was no better than old iron! At that same instant it seemed to me that the whole world burst into a tremendous roar and ten thousand blazing stars–but it only was the sword of that confounded Russian major banging against my skull!”
The little woman was almost sobbing. She took her husband’s hand in both of hers.
“But you see that I was not killed, little one,” he said; and he raised her hands to his lips and kissed them.
“It was not until the next day, Monsieur,” he went on, “that I knew anything. Then I was in the hospital.
“‘How did it go?’ I asked of the hospital-steward.
“‘Shut up,’ said the steward.
“This made me angry. ‘How did it go, polisson?‘ I cried. ‘Tell me, or I’ll crush your bones.’
“Then the man was more civil. ‘The Russians were driven back,’ he said, ‘and a lot of them were captured. You owe it to the same Russian major who almost killed you that your life was saved. As soon as he was brought into camp he sent a message to the general begging that you might be looked after quickly. If there was any life left in you, it was worth saving, he said, for you were a brave man–and he told how you had spiked those last two guns! Parbleu, but for that message you would have died! When they brought you in here you were nearly gone!’
“‘And the lieutenant who ran away?’ I asked.
“‘Oh, he was killed–as he deserved. Now you know all about it. Hold your tongue.’
“I felt so foolishly weak, and there was such a pain in my head as I began to remember it all once more, that I could not ask any more questions. Presently my head began to buzz and the pain in it to get worse, and then for a week I had a fever that came near to taking me off. But I pulled through”–he squeezed his wife’s hand, that again had been laid in his–“and in three weeks I was back with the regiment again. It was all due to my having such a wonderfully thick skull, the doctors said, that the major’s sword had not broken it past all mending. When I came into camp the boys all cheered me, and I was as proud as a cock. And then, the first thing I knew, up came a corporal and a file of men and arrested me.
“‘What am I arrested for?’ I asked.
“‘For being absent without leave from your regiment during battle,’ said the corporal, and marched me off to the guard-house. Then I was not proud at all. But I was very angry. That I should be arrested in this fashion did not seem to me fair.