Hassi-Inifel:  thirty native Arabs and four Europeans—­myself, the Sergeant, a Corporal, and Gourrut.  The threat was terrible.  It had its effect.

“All right, then, Lieutenant,” he said with a great sigh.  “But afterwards you must not blame me for having told you things about a superior which should not be told and come only from the talk I overheard at mess.”

“Tell away.”

“It was in 1899.  I was then Mess Sergeant at Sfax, with the 4th Spahis.  I had a good record, and besides, as I did not drink, the Adjutant had assigned me to the officers’ mess.  It was a soft berth.  The marketing, the accounts, recording the library books which were borrowed (there weren’t many), and the key of the wine cupboard,—­for with that you can’t trust orderlies.  The Colonel was young and dined at mess.  One evening he came in late, looking perturbed, and, as soon as he was seated, called for silence: 

“‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ’I have a communication to make to you, and I shall ask for your advice.  Here is the question.  Tomorrow morning the City of Naples lands at Sfax.  Aboard her is Captain de Saint-Avit, recently assigned to Feriana, en route to his post.’

“The Colonel paused.  ‘Good,’ thought I, ’tomorrow’s menu is about to be considered.’  For you know the custom, Lieutenant, which has existed ever since there have been any officers’ clubs in Africa.  When an officer is passing by, his comrades go to meet him at the boat and invite him to remain with them for the length of his stay in port.  He pays his score in news from home.  On such occasions everything is of the best, even for a simple lieutenant.  At Sfax an officer on a visit meant—­one extra course, vintage wine and old liqueurs.

“But this time I imagined from the looks the officers exchanged that perhaps the old stock would stay undisturbed in its cupboard.

“’You have all, I think, heard of Captain de Saint-Avit, gentlemen, and the rumors about him.  It is not for us to inquire into them, and the promotion he has had, his decoration if you will, permits us to hope that they are without foundation.  But between not suspecting an officer of being a criminal, and receiving him at our table as a comrade, there is a gulf that we are not obliged to bridge.  That is the matter on which I ask your advice.’

“There was silence.  The officers looked at each other, all of them suddenly quite grave, even to the merriest of the second lieutenants.  In the corner, where I realized that they had forgotten me, I tried not to make the least sound that might recall my presence.

“‘We thank you, Colonel,’ one of the majors finally replied, ’for your courtesy in consulting us.  All my comrades, I imagine, know to what terrible rumors you refer.  If I may venture to say so, in Paris at the Army Geographical Service, where I was before coming here, most of the officers of the highest standing had an opinion on this unfortunate matter which they avoided stating, but which cast no glory upon Captain de Saint-Avit.’