They parted.  General Raimbaut looked back more than once at the firm, intrepid figure that stood there unflinching, on the edge of the grave.  But he never took his eye off Raynal.  The next minute the sad letter was finished, and Raynal walked out of the tent, and confronted the man he had challenged to single combat.

I have mentioned elsewhere that Colonel Dujardin had eyes strangely compounded of battle and love, of the dove and the hawk.  And these, softened by a noble act he meditated, now rested on Raynal with a strange expression of warmth and goodness.  This strange gaze struck Raynal, so far at least as this; he saw it was no hostile eye.  He was glad of that, for his own heart was calmed and softened by the solemn prospect before him.

“We, too, have a little account to settle before I order out the men,” said he, calmly, “and I can’t give you a long credit.  I am pressed for time.”

“Our quarrel is at an end.  When duty sounds the recall, a soldier’s heart leaves private feuds.  See!  I come to you without anger and ill-will.  Just now my voice was loud, my manner, I dare say, offensive, and menacing even, and that always tempts a brave fellow like you to resist.  But now, you see, I am harmless as a woman.  We are alone.  Humbug to the winds!  I know that you are the only man in this army fit to command a division.  I know that when you say the assault of that bastion is death, death it is.  To the point then; now that my manner is no longer irritating, now that I am going to die, Camille Dujardin, my old comrade, have you the heart to refuse me? am I to die unhappy?”

“No; no:  I will do whatever you like.”

“You will marry that poor girl, then?”

“Yes.”

“Aha! did not I always say he was a good fellow?  Clench the nail; give me your honor.”

“I give you my honor to marry her, if I live.”

“You take a load off me; may Heaven reward you.  In one hour those poor women, whose support I had promised to be, will lose their protector; but I give them another in you.  We shall not leave that family in tears, Rose in shame, and your child without a name.”

Dujardin stared at the speaker.  What new and devilish deception was this?

“My child!” he faltered.  “What child?”

“Ah,” said Raynal, “what a fool I was!  That is the first thing I ought to have told you.  Poor little fellow!  I surprised him in his cradle; his mother and Josephine were rocking him, and singing over him.  Oh! it was a scene, I can tell you.  My poor wife had been ill for some time, and was so weakened by it, that I frightened her into a fit, stealing a march on her that way.  She fainted away.  Perhaps it is as well she did; for I—­I did not know what to think; it looked ugly; but while she lay at our feet insensible, I forced the truth from Rose; she owned the boy was hers.”