grace it so well--"

"Ouf! I have had so much of it," said the little one contemptuously. "It
is so tame to me. Clouds of dust, scurry of horses, fanfare of trumpets,
thunder of drums, and all for nothing! Bah! I have been in a dozen
battles--I--and I am not likely to care much for a sham fight."

"Nay, she is unjust to herself," murmured Leon Ramon. "She gave up the
fete to do this mercy--it has been a great one. She is more generous
than she will ever allow. Here, Cigarette, look at these scarlet
rosebuds; they are like your bright cheeks. Will you have them? I have
nothing else to give."

"Rosebuds!" echoed Cigarette, with supreme scorn. "Rosebuds for me? I
know no rose but the red of the tricolor; and I could not tell a weed
from a flower. Besides, I told Miou-Matou just now, if my children do as
I tell them, they will not take a leaf or a peach-stone from this grande
dame--how does she call herself?--Mme. Corona d'Amague!"

Cecil looked up quickly: "Why not?"

Cigarette flashed on him her brilliant, brown eyes with a fire that
amazed him.

"Because we are soldiers, not paupers!"

"Surely; but--"

"And it is not for the silver pheasants, who have done nothing to
deserve their life but lain in nests of cotton wool, and eaten grain
that others sow and shell for them, and spread their shining plumage in
a sun that never clouds above their heads, to insult, with the insolence
of their 'pity' and their 'charity,' the heroes of France, who perish as
they have lived, for their Country and their Flag!"

It was a superb peroration! If the hapless flowers lying there had been
a cartel of outrage to the concrete majesty of the French Army, the
Army's champion could not have spoken with more impassioned force and
scorn.

Cecil laughed slightly; but he answered, with a certain annoyance:

"There is no 'insolence' here; no question of it. Mme. la Princesse
desired to offer some gift to the soldiers of Algiers; I suggested to
her that to increase the scant comforts of the hospital, and gladden the
weary eyes of sick men with beauties that the Executive never dreams of
bestowing, would be the most merciful and acceptable mode of exercising
her kindness. If blame there be in the matter, it is mine."

In defending the generosity of what he knew to be a genuine and sincere
wish to gratify his comrades, he betrayed what he did not intend to have
revealed, namely, the conversation that had passed between himself
and the S