In presence of such avowals doubt was no longer possible. The drum-major

soon became emboldened and raised the tips of his fingers to his lips.

His kisses journeyed through space; and then with his hands clasped he

begged of Zouhra to return them.

I must confess that the wretched girl defended herself for a few minutes

with bashful reserve. But she was so pressed and implored that at last I

saw her weaken, and anxious and hesitating, she yielded.

I was betrayed!

Mohammed sank down, uttering a plaintive moan. For my own part I thought

of my uncle's misfortune. Was it fate?

However, my uncle is not the only man who comes from Marseilles; I also

come from that city, and although I am merely his nephew, I have at

times enough of his hot disposition to feel as he felt after similar

strokes of fate. Having been drawn into his irregular orbit, passing

through the same phases as he passed through, I must expect that nothing

will ever happen to me in the same way as it would happen to others,

himself excepted. Thus the similarity of our adventures--the drum-major

in my case taking the place of my uncle's Jean Bonaffé,--ought not to

have surprised me; it should have been foreseen like a philosophical

contingency previously inscribed in the book of destiny. And, indeed, to

tell the truth, I should have considered the slightest departure from

the precise law of fate illogical.

However, I was either in a bad disposition of mind or I had been too

suddenly and speedily awakened from the presumptuous quietude into which

I had sunk, for I will admit to you that on thinking over my case, I

experienced at the moment a singular feeling of astonishment.

Horns are like teeth, a witty woman once said: they hurt while they are

coming, but afterwards one manages to put up with them!

True as this remark of an experienced person may be, yet having my own

ideas as to these vain appendages which I could not prevent from

sprouting; and being, moreover, sufficiently provided with proofs which

I had duly weighed, my first idea was to dart head first athwart this

intrigue in which my dishonour was a certainty. Leaving Mohammed upon

the divan where he had stranded, I hastened by way of the stairs to the

guilty creature's room.

I softly opened the closed door, stepped gently over the carpet, and

approached her from behind in time to catch her just as she had one hand

on her heart and the other on her lips.

She gave a little shriek, while the drum-major, on seeing me appear so

suddenly, made a gesture of despair. Then he drew back with such haste

that his plume caught against the wall above the window, with the result

that his bearskin was knocked off, and turning a sommersault fell into

the courtyard.




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