e? Well, he was what you are--a hawk among
carrion crows, a gentleman in the ranks. Dieu! how handsome he was!
Nobody ever knew his real name, but they thought he was of Austrian
breed, and we called him Marquise because he was so womanish white
in his skin and dainty in all his ways. Just like you! Marquise could
fight, fight like a hundred devils; and--pouf!--how proud he was--very
much like you altogether! Now, one day something went wrong in the
exercise ground. Marquise was not to blame, but they thought he was; and
an adjutant struck him--flick, flack, like that--across the face with
a riding switch. Marquise had his bayonet fixed and before we knew what
was up, crash the blade went through--through the breast-bone, and out
at the spine--and the adjutant fell as dead as a cat, with the blood
spouting out like a fountain. 'I come of a great race, that never took
insult without giving back death,' was all that Marquise said when they
seized him and brought him to judgment; and he would never say of what
race that was. They shot him--ah, bah! discipline must be kept--and I
saw him with five great wounds in his chest, and his beautiful golden
hair all soiled with the sand and the powder, lying there by the open
grave, that they threw him into as if he were offal; and we never knew
more of him than that."

Cigarette's radiant laugh had died, and her careless voice had sunk,
over the latter words. As the little vivacious brunette told the tale of
a nameless life, it took its eloquence from her, simple and brief as
her speech was; and it owned a deeper pathos because the reckless young
Bacchante of the As de Pique grew grave one moment while she told it.
Then, grave still, she leaned her brown, bright face nearer down from
her oval hole in the wall.

"Now," she whispered very low, "if you mutiny once, they will shoot you
just like Marquise, and you will die just as silent, like him."

"Well," he answered her slowly, "why not? Death is no great terror; I
risk it every day for the sake of a common soldier's rations; why should
I not chance it for the sake and in the defense of my honor?"

"Bah! men sell their honor for their daily bread all the world over!"
said Cigarette, with the satire that had treble raciness from the slang
in which she clothed it. "But it is not you alone. See here--one example
set on your part, and half your regiment will mutiny too. It is bitter
work to obey the Black Hawk, and if you give the si