Chapter 3

There was never any talk of a recovery, and no time was lost in getting
the man's deposition. He gave but the one account of it: that he had
committed suicide because he was sick of seeing so many Englishmen. The
doctor vowed it was impossible, the nature and direction of the wound
forbidding it. Goguelat replied that he was more ingenious than the
other thought for, and had propped up the weapon in the ground and
fallen on the point--"just like Nebuchadnezzar," he added, winking to
the assistants. The doctor, who was a little, spruce, ruddy man of an
impatient temper, pished and pshawed and swore over his patient.
"Nothing could be made of him!" he cried. "A perfect heathen. If we
could only find the weapon!" But the weapon had ceased to exist. A
little resined twine was perhaps blowing about in the Castle gutters;
some bits of broken stick may have trailed in corners; and behold, in
the pleasant air of the morning, a dandy prisoner trimming his nails
with a pair of scissors!

Finding the wounded man so firm, you may be sure the authorities did not
leave the rest of us in peace. No stone was left unturned. We were had
in again and again to be examined, now singly, now in twos and threes.
We were threatened with all sorts of impossible severities and tempted
with all manner of improbable rewards. I suppose I was five times
interrogated, and came off from each with flying colours. I am like old
Souvaroff: I cannot understand a soldier being taken aback by any
question: he should answer, as he marches on the fire, with an instant
briskness and gaiety. I may have been short of bread, gold, or grace; I
was never found wanting in an answer. My comrades, if they were not all
so ready, were none of them less staunch; and I may say here at once
that the inquiry came to nothing at the time, and the death of Goguelat
remained a mystery of the prison. Such were the veterans of France! And
yet I should be disingenuous if I did not own this was a case apart; in
ordinary circumstances, some one might have stumbled or been intimidated
into an admission; and what bound us together with a closeness beyond
that of mere comrades was a secret to which we were all committed and a
design in which all were equally engaged. No need to inquire as to its
nature: there is only one desire, and only one kind of design, that
blooms in prisons. And the fact that our tunnel was near done supported
and inspired us.

I came off in public, as I have said, with flying colours; the sittings
of the court of inquiry died away like a tune that no one listens to;
and yet I was unmasked--I, whom my very adversary defended, as good as
confessed, as good as told the nature of the quarrel, and by so doing
prepared for myself in the future a most anxious, disagreeable
adventure. It was the third morning after the duel, and Goguelat was
still in life, when the time came round for me to give Major Chevenix a
lesson. I was fond of this occupation; not that he paid me much--no
more, indeed, than eighteenpence a month, the customary figure, being a
miser in the grain; but because I liked his breakfasts and (to some
extent) himself. At least, he was a man of education; and of the others
with whom I had any opportunity of speech, those that would not have
held a book upside down would have torn the pages out for pipe-lights.
For I must repeat again that our body of prisoners was exceptional:
there was in Edinburgh Castle none of that educational busyness that
distinguished some of the other prisons, so that men entered them unable
to read, and left them fit for high employments. Chevenix was handsome,
and surprisingly young to be a major: six feet in his stockings, well
set up, with regular features and very clear grey eyes. It was
impossible to pick a fault in him, and yet the sum-total was
displeasing. Perhaps he was too clean; he seemed to bear about with him
the smell of soap. Cleanliness is good, but I cannot bear a man's nails
to seem japanned. And certainly he was too self-possessed and cold.
There was none of the fire of youth, none of the swiftness of the
soldier, in this young officer. His kindness was cold, and cruel cold;
his deliberation exasperating. And perhaps it was from this character,
which is very much the opposite of my own, that even in these days, when
he was of service to me, I approached him with suspicion and reserve.

I looked over his exercise in the usual form, and marked six faults.

"H'm. Six," says he, looking at the paper. "Very annoying! I can never
get it right."

"O, but you make excellent progress!" I said. I would not discourage
him, you understand, but he was congenitally unable to learn French.
Some fire, I think, is needful, and he had quenched his fire in
soapsuds.

He put the exercise down, leaned his chin upon his hand, and looked at
me with clear, severe eyes.

"I think we must have a little talk," said he.

"I am entirely at your disposition," I replied; but I quaked, for I knew
what subject to expect.

"You have been some time giving me these lessons," he went on, "and I am
tempted to think rather well of you. I believe you are a gentleman."

"I have that honour, sir," said I.

"You have seen me for the same period. I do not know how I strike you;
but perhaps you will be prepared to believe that I also am a man of
honour," said he.

"I require no assurances; the thing is manifest," and I bowed.

"Very well, then," said he. "What about this Goguelat?"

"You heard me yesterday before the court," I began. "I was awakened
only----"

"O yes; I 'heard you yesterday before the court,' no doubt," he
interrupted, "and I remember perfectly that you were 'awakened only.' I
could repeat the most of it by rote, indeed. But do you suppose that I
believed you for a moment?"

"Neither would you believe me if I were to repeat it here," said I.

"I may be wrong--we shall soon see," says he; "but my impression is that
you will not 'repeat it here.' My impression is that you have come into
this room, and that you will tell me something before you go out."

I shrugged my shoulders.

"Let me explain," he continued. "Your evidence, of course, is nonsense.
I put it by, and the court put it by."

"My compliments and thanks!" said I.

"You _must_ know--that's the short and the long," he proceeded. "All of
you in Shed B are bound to know. And I want to ask you where is the
common sense of keeping up this farce, and maintaining this
cock-and-bull story between friends. Come, come, my good fellow, own
yourself beaten, and laugh at it yourself."

"Well, I hear you--go ahead," said I. "You put your heart in it."

He crossed his legs slowly. "I can very well understand," he began,
"that precautions have had to be taken. I dare say an oath was
administered. I can comprehend that perfectly." (He was watching me all
the time with his cold, bright eyes.) "And I can comprehend that, about
an affair of honour, you would be very particular to keep it."

"About an affair of honour?" I repeated, like a man quite puzzled.

"It was not an affair of honour, then?" he asked.

"What was not? I do not follow," said I.

He gave no sign of impatience; simply sat a while silent, and began
again in the same placid and good-natured voice: "The court and I were
at one in setting aside your evidence. It could not deceive a child. But
there was a difference between myself and the other officers, because _I
knew my man_ and they did not. They saw in you a common soldier, and I
knew you for a gentleman. To them your evidence was a leash of lies,
which they yawned to hear you telling. Now, I was asking myself, how far
will a gentleman go? Not surely so far as to help hush a murder up? So
that--when I heard you tell how you knew nothing of the matter, and were
only awakened by the corporal, and all the rest of it--I translated your
statements into something else. Now, Champdivers," he cried, springing
up lively and coming towards me with animation, "I am going to tell you
what that was, and you are going to help me to see justice done: how, I
don't know, for of course you are under oath--but somehow. Mark what I'm
going to say."

At that moment he laid a heavy, hard grip upon my shoulder; and whether
he said anything more or came to a full stop at once, I am sure I could
not tell you to this day. For, as the devil would have it, the shoulder
he laid hold of was the one Goguelat had pinked. The wound was but a
scratch; it was healing with the first intention; but in the clutch of
Major Chevenix it gave me agony. My head swam; the sweat poured off my
face; I must have grown deadly pale.

He removed his hand as suddenly as he had laid it there.

"What is wrong with you?" said he.

"It is nothing," said I. "A qualm. It has gone by."

"Are you sure?" said he. "You are as white as a sheet."

"O no, I assure you! Nothing whatever. I am my own man again," I said,
though I could scarce command my tongue.

"Well, shall I go on again?" says he. "Can you follow me?"

"O, by all means!" said I, and mopped my streaming face upon my sleeve,
for you may be sure in those days I had no handkerchief.

"If you are sure you can follow me. That was a very sudden and sharp
seizure," he said doubtfully. "But if you are sure, all right, and here
goes. An affair of honour among you fellows would, naturally, be a
little difficult to carry out; perhaps it would be impossible to have it
wholly regular. And yet a duel might be very irregular in form, and,
under the peculiar circumstances of the case, loyal enough in effect. Do
you take me? Now, as a gentleman and a soldier."

His hand rose again at the words and hovered over me. I could bear no
more, and winced away from him. "No," I cried, "not that. Do not put
your hand upon my shoulder. I cannot bear it. It is rheumatism," I made
haste to add. "My shoulder is inflamed and very painful."

He returned to his chair and deliberately lighted a cigar.

"I am sorry about your shoulder," he said at last. "Let me send for the
doctor."

"Not in the least," said I. "It is a trifle. I am quite used to it. It
does not trouble me in the smallest. At any rate, I don't believe in
doctors."

"All right," said he, and sat and smoked a good while in a silence which
I would have given anything to break. "Well," he began presently, "I
believe there is nothing left for me to learn. I presume I may say that
I know all."

"About what?" said I boldly.

"About Goguelat," said he.

"I beg your pardon. I cannot conceive," said I.

"O," says the major, "the man fell in a duel, and by your hand! I am not
an infant."

"By no means," said I. "But you seem to me to be a good deal of a
theorist."

"Shall we test it?" he asked. "The doctor is close by. If there is not
an open wound on your shoulder, I am wrong. If there is----" He waved
his hand. "But I advise you to think twice. There is a deuce of a nasty
drawback to the experiment--that what might have remained private
between us two becomes public property."

"O, well!" said I, with a laugh, "anything rather than a doctor! I
cannot bear the breed."

His last words had a good deal relieved me, but I was still far from
comfortable.

Major Chevenix smoked a while, looking now at his cigar ash, now at me.
"I'm a soldier myself," he says presently, "and I've been out in my time
and hit my man. I don't want to run any one into a corner for an affair
that was at all necessary or correct. At the same time, I want to know
that much, and I'll take your word of honour for it. Otherwise, I shall
be very sorry, but the doctor must be called in."

"I neither admit anything nor deny anything," I returned. "But if this
form of words will suffice you, here is what I say: I give you my
parole, as a gentleman and a soldier, there has nothing taken place
amongst us prisoners that was not honourable as the day."

"All right," says he. "That was all I wanted. You can go now,
Champdivers."

And as I was going out he added, with a laugh: "By the bye, I ought to
apologise: I had no idea I was applying the torture!"

The same afternoon the doctor came into the courtyard with a piece of
paper in his hand. He seemed hot and angry, and had certainly no mind to
be polite.

"Here!" he cried. "Which of you fellows knows any English? O!"--spying
me--"there you are, what's your name! _You_'ll do. Tell these fellows
that the other fellow's dying. He's booked; no use talking; I expect
he'll go by evening. And tell them I don't envy the feelings of the
fellow who spiked him. Tell them that first."

I did so.

"Then you can tell 'em," he resumed, "that the fellow, Goggle--what's
his name?--wants to see some of them before he gets his marching orders.
If I got it right, he wants to kiss or embrace you, or some sickening
stuff. Got that? Then here's a list he's had written, and you'd better
read it out to them--I can't make head or tail of your beastly
names--and they can answer _present_, and fall in against that wall."

It was with a singular movement of incongruous feelings that I read the
first name on the list. I had no wish to look again on my own handiwork;
my flesh recoiled from the idea; and how could I be sure what reception
he designed to give me? The cure was in my own hand; I could pass that
first name over--the doctor would not know--and I might stay away. But
to the subsequent great gladness of my heart, I did not dwell for an
instant on the thought, walked over to the designated wall, faced about,
read out the name "Champdivers," and answered myself with the word
"Present."

There were some half-dozen on the list, all told; and as soon as we were
mustered, the doctor led the way to the hospital, and we followed after,
like a fatigue-party, in single file. At the door he paused, told us
"the fellow" would see each of us alone, and, as soon as I had explained
that, sent me by myself into the ward. It was a small room, whitewashed;
a south window stood open on a vast depth of air and a spacious and
distant prospect; and from deep below, in the Grassmarket, the voices of
hawkers came up clear and far away. Hard by, on a little bed, lay
Goguelat. The sunburn had not yet faded from his face, and the stamp of
death was already there. There was something wild and unmannish in his
smile, that took me by the throat; only death and love know or have ever
seen it. And when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse talk.

He held out his arms as if to embrace me. I drew near with incredible
shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms with overwhelming
disgust. But he only drew my ear down to his lips.

"Trust me," he whispered. "_Je suis bon bougre, moi._ I'll take it to
hell with me and tell the devil."

Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and trivialities? All that
he thought, at that hour, was even noble, though he could not clothe it
otherwise than in the language of a brutal farce. Presently he bade me
call the doctor; and when that officer had come in, raised himself a
little up in his bed, pointed first to himself and then to me, who stood
weeping by his side, and several times repeated the expression,
"Frinds--frinds--dam frinds."

To my great surprise the doctor appeared very much affected. He nodded
his little bob-wigged head at us, and said repeatedly, "All right,
Johnny--me comprong."

Then Goguelat shook hands with me, embraced me again, and I went out of
the room sobbing like an infant.

How often have I not seen it, that the most unpardonable fellows make
the happiest exits! It is a fate we may well envy them. Goguelat was
detested in life; in the last three days, by his admirable staunchness
and consideration, he won every heart; and when word went about the
prison the same evening that he was no more, the voice of conversation
became hushed as in a house of mourning.

For myself, I was like a man distracted; I cannot think what ailed me:
when I awoke the following day, nothing remained of it; but that night I
was filled with a gloomy fury of the nerves. I had killed him; he had
done his utmost to protect me; I had seen him with that awful smile. And
so illogical and useless is this sentiment of remorse that I was ready,
at a word or a look, to quarrel with somebody else. I presume the
disposition of my mind was imprinted on my face; and when, a little
after, I overtook, saluted, and addressed the doctor, he looked on me
with commiseration and surprise.

I had asked him if it was true.

"Yes," he said, "the fellow's gone."

"Did he suffer much?" I asked.

"Devil a bit; passed away like a lamb," said he. He looked on me a
little, and I saw his hand go to his fob. "Here, take that! no sense in
fretting," he said, and, putting a silver twopenny-bit in my hand, he
left me.

I should have had that twopenny framed to hang upon the wall, for it
was the man's one act of charity in all my knowledge of him. Instead of
that I stood looking at it in my hand and laughed out bitterly, as I
realised his mistake; then went to the ramparts, and flung it far into
the air like blood-money. The night was falling; through an embrasure
and across the gardened valley I saw the lamp-lighters hasting along
Princes Street with ladder and lamp, and looked on moodily. As I was so
standing a hand was laid upon my shoulder, and I turned about. It was
Major Chevenix, dressed for the evening, and his neckcloth really
admirably folded. I never denied the man could dress.

"Ah!" said he, "I thought it was you, Champdivers. So he's gone?"

I nodded.

"Come, come," said he, "you must cheer up. Of course it's very
distressing, very painful and all that. But do you know, it ain't such a
bad thing either for you or me? What with his death and your visit to
him I am entirely reassured."

So I was to owe my life to Goguelat at every point.

"I had rather not discuss it," said I.

"Well," said he, "one word more and I'll agree to bury the subject. What
did you fight about?"

"O, what do men ever fight about?" I cried.

"A lady?" said he.

I shrugged my shoulders.

"Deuce you did!" said he. "I should scarce have thought it of him."

And at this my ill-humour broke fairly out in words. "He!" I cried. "He
never dared to address her--only to look at her and vomit his vile
insults! She may have given him sixpence: if she did, it may take him to
heaven yet!"

At this I became aware of his eyes set upon me with a considering look,
and brought up sharply.

"Well, well," said he. "Good-night to you, Champdivers. Come to me at
breakfast-time to-morrow, and we'll talk of other subjects."

I fully admit the man's conduct was not bad: in writing it down so long
after the events I can even see that it was good.