"--B. shook hands
with Jean and Mexique and the Machine-Fixer and the Young Skipper, and
Bathhouse John (to whom he had given his ambulance tunic, and who was
crazy-proud in consequence) and the Norwegian and the Washing Machine Man
and The Hat and many of _les hommes_ whom we scarcely knew.--The Black
Holster was roaring:
"_Allez, nom de Dieu, l'americain!_"
I went down the room with B. and Pete, and shook hands with both at the
door. The other _partis_, alias The Trick Raincoat and The Fighting
Sheeney, were already on the way downstairs. The Black Holster cursed us
and me in particular and slammed the door angrily in my face--
Through the little peephole I caught a glimpse of them, entering the
street. I went to my bed and lay down quietly in my great _pelisse_. The
clamour and filth of the room brightened and became distant and faded. I
heard the voice of the jolly Alsatian saying:
"_Courage, mon ami_, your comrade is not dead; you will see him later,"
and after that, nothing. In front of and on and within my eyes lived
suddenly a violent and gentle and dark silence.
The Three Wise Men had done their work. But wisdom cannot rest....
Probably at that very moment they were holding their court in another La
Ferte committing to incomparable anguish some few merely perfectly
wretched criminals: little and tall, tremulous and brave--all of them
white and speechless, all of them with tight bluish lips and large
whispering eyes, all of them with fingers weary and mutilated and
extraordinarily old .
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