My surprise was as great as the Sergeant's. But just then I saw the
evil, weasel-like face of Gourrut, the convict we used as clerk. He
had stopped his scrawling and was listening with a sly interest.
"Sergeant, Captain de Saint-Avit is my ranking classmate," I answered
dryly.
Chatelain saluted, and left the room. I followed.
"There, there," I said, clapping him on the back, "no hard feelings.
Remember that in an hour we are starting for the oasis. Have the
cartridges ready. It is of the utmost importance to restock the
larder."
I went back to the office and motioned Gourrut to go. Left alone, I
finished Mlle. de C----'s letter very quickly, and then reread the
decision of the Ministry giving the post a new chief.
It was now five months that I had enjoyed that distinction, and on my
word, I had accepted the responsibility well enough, and been very
well pleased with the independence. I can even affirm, without taking
too much credit for myself, that under my command discipline had been
better maintained than under Captain Dieulivol, Saint-Avit's
predecessor. A brave man, this Captain Dieulivol, a non-commissioned
officer under Dodds and Duchesne, but subject to a terrible propensity
for strong liquors, and too much inclined, when he had drunk, to
confuse his dialects, and to talk to a Houassa in Sakalave. No one was
ever more sparing of the post water supply. One morning when he was
preparing his absinthe in the presence of the Sergeant, Chatelain,
noticing the Captain's glass, saw with amazement that the green liquor
was blanched by a far stronger admixture of water than usual. He
looked up, aware that something abnormal had just occurred. Rigid, the
carafe inverted in his hand, Captain Dieulivol was spilling the water
which was running over on the sugar. He was dead.
For six months, since the disappearance of this sympathetic old
tippler, the Powers had not seemed to interest themselves in finding
his successor. I had even hoped at times that a decision might be
reached investing me with the rights that I was in fact exercising....
And today this surprising appointment.
Captain de Saint-Avit. He was of my class at St. Cyr. I had lost track
of him. Then my attention had been attracted to him by his rapid
advancement, his decoration, the well-deserved recognition of three
particularly daring expeditions of exploration to Tebesti and the Air;
and suddenly, the mysterious drama of his fourth expedition, that
famous mission undertaken with Captain Morhange, from which only one
of the explorers came back. Everything is forgotten quickly in France.
That was at least six years ago. I had not heard Saint-Avit mentioned
since. I had even supposed that he had left the army. And now, I was
to have him as my chief.