h manner
in which a young girl by merely existing in his sight can make a man of
forty her own. They were going to be married as soon as General D'Hubert
had obtained his official nomination to a promised command.

One afternoon, sitting on the terrasse of the Cafe Tortoni, General
D'Hubert learned from the conversation of two strangers occupying
a table near his own, that General Feraud, included in the batch of
superior officers arrested after the second return of the king, was in
danger of passing before the Special Commission. Living all his spare
moments, as is frequently the case with expectant lovers, a day in
advance of reality, and in a state of bestarred hallucination, it
required nothing less than the name of his perpetual antagonist
pronounced in a loud voice to call the youngest of Napoleon's generals
away from the mental contemplation of his betrothed. He looked round.
The strangers wore civilian clothes. Lean and weather-beaten, lolling
back in their chairs, they scowled at people with moody and defiant
abstraction from under their hats pulled low over their eyes. It was not
difficult to recognize them for two of the compulsorily retired officers
of the Old Guard. As from bravado or carelessness they chose to speak in
loud tones, General D'Hubert, who saw no reason why he should change his
seat, heard every word. They did not seem to be the personal friends of
General Feraud. His name came up amongst others. Hearing it repeated,
General D'Hubert's tender anticipations of a domestic future adorned
with a woman's grace were traversed by the harsh regret of his warlike
past, of that one long, intoxicating clash of arms, unique in the
magnitude of its glory and disaster--the marvellous work and the special
possession of his own generation. He felt an irrational tenderness
towards his old adversary and appreciated emotionally the murderous
absurdity their encounter had introduced into his life. It was like an
additional pinch of spice in a hot dish. He remembered the flavour with
sudden melancholy. He would never taste it again. It was all over. "I
fancy it was being left lying in the garden that had exasperated him so
against me from the first," he thought, indulgently.

The two strangers at the next table had fallen silent after the third
mention of General Feraud's name. Presently the elder of the two,
speaking again in a bitter tone, affirmed that General Feraud's account
was settled. And why? Simply be