I was just in time: the General himself had already reached the right of my section. I stood with sword at the salute, my right hand grasping its hilt, my left kneading the greasy paper containing my recent purchase--a penny-worth of bread and a nameless pork confection, which perspired.
The General halts before me; young, well set-up in his tunic, with a face refined and full of energy.
Did I not know it? I felt the sandwich being reduced to pulp in my own hand.
A touch of legerdemain and my sword has passed into my left hand. I grip firmly the hand extended to me and answer loudly, distinctly, fairly meeting his eyes:
And that is a lie: I am highly excited. I should have been ashamed not to be. There were so many impressions, so many fleeting reflections to shake me from head to foot! But I well understood that "Don't you feel excited?" of the General. I said "No:" I spoke the truth.
We were going to Troyes. So at least we were told. From Troyes, we were evidently to proceed straight to Mulhouse, to occupy and defend that captured town. This also we were told.
The prospect delighted me. To go to Alsace and remain there was certainly not so glorious as to have won our way there; but, at the same time, the prospect was not one to be despised.
We defiled through the town: roadways echoing, handkerchiefs waving, some laughter, some tears.
A mistake in the route cost us a few additional miles of measured tramping. Gradually the pace grew easier, for the oldest reservists, still plump, perspired freely, making no complaint, however.
We saw some of our wounded before the doorway of a large grey building. They held out at arm's length for our inspection spiked helmets and little round forage caps with red bands on a khaki ground.
"We also!" we cried. "We are going there, my friends!"
A young workgirl, fair and buxom, smiles upon me, displaying all her teeth. She has a small, well-poised head and inviting, ruddy cheeks. Her smile does me a world of good; for I am going to war; the morrow perhaps will see me in the thick of it!
The train, at last. A mere black line of gaping trucks with a few first-class carriages. Entraining is a big affair; the young major, a dark and energetic man, urges his horse from group to group, shouting directions and commands. A constant murmur arises from the onlookers. Why in the name of everything has he given the order for the little tricoloured flags, which a moment since were waving above the marching battalion, to be removed?...