l happier than when we sat
down.

"And after the occasion, whither?" I asked them.

"I back to France," answered Varvilliers.

"We to Munich," said Coralie, with a shrug.

"I the deuce knows where," laughed Wetter.

"I also the deuce knows where. Come, then, to our next merry supper!" I
poured out a glass of wine. They all followed my example, and we drank.

"But we shall have no more," said Wetter.

A moment's silence fell on us all. Then Wetter spoke again. He turned to
them and indicated me with a gesture.

"He's a good fellow, our Augustin."

"Yes, a good fellow," said Varvilliers.

"A very good fellow," muttered Struboff, who was more than a little gone
in liquor.

"A good fellow," said Coralie. Then she stepped up to me, put her hands
on my shoulders, and kissed me on both cheeks. "A good fellow, our
little Augustin," said she.

There was nothing much in this; casual phrases of goodwill, spoken at a
moment of conviviality, the outcome of genuine but perhaps not very deep
feeling, except for that trifle of the kisses almost an ordinary
accompaniment or conclusion of an evening's entertainment. I was a good
fellow; the light praise had been lightly won. Yet even now as I write,
looking back over the years, I can not, when I accuse myself of
mawkishness, be altogether convinced by the self-denunciation. For what
it was worth, the thing came home to me; for a moment it overleaped the
barriers that were round me, the differences that made a hedge between
me and them; for a moment they had forgotten that I was not merely their
good comrade. I would not have people forget often what I am; but now
and then it is pleasant to be no more than what I myself am. And the two
there, Wetter and Varvilliers, were the nearest to friends that I have
known. One went back to his country, the other the deuce knew where. I
should be alone.

Alone I made my way back from Wetter's house, alone and on foot. I had a
fancy to walk thus through the decorated streets; alone to pause an
instant before the Countess' door, recollecting many things; alone to
tell myself that the stocking must be kept over the graze, and that the
asking of sympathy was the betrayal of my soul's confidence to me; alone
to be weak, alone to be strong; alone to determine to do my work with my
own life, alone to hope that I must not render too wretched the life of
another. I had good from that walk of mine. For you see, when a man is
alone, above all,