“My friend, Jean d’Anglemare, is, as you know, a captain in a dragoon regiment, who is quartered in the barracks in the Rue de la Rivette, and when he got to his quarters the other morning, he found that two men of his squadron had had a terrible quarrel.  The rules about military honor are very severe, and so a duel took place between them.  After the duel they became reconciled, and when their officer questioned them, they told him what their quarrel had been about.  They had fought on Madame Bonderoi’s account.”

“Oh!”

“Yes, my dear fellow, about Madame Bonderoi.”

“But I will let Trooper Siballe speak.”

“This is how it was, Captain.  About a year and a half ago, I was lounging about the barrack-yard, between six and seven o’clock in the evening, when a woman came up and spoke to me, and said, just as if she had been asking her way:  ’Soldier, would you like to earn ten francs a week, honestly?’ Of course, I told her that I decidedly should, and so she said:  ’Come and see me at twelve o’clock to-morrow morning.  I am Madame Bonderoi, and my address is No. 6, Rue de la Tranchee.’  ’You may rely upon my being there, Madame.’  And then she went away, looking very pleased, and she added:  ‘I am very much obliged to you, soldier.’  ’I am obliged to you, Madame,’ I replied.  But I plagued my head about the matter, until the time came, all the same.

“At twelve o’clock, exactly, I rang the bell, and she let me in herself.  She had a lot of ribbons on her head.

“‘We must make haste,’ she said; ‘as my servant might come in.’

“‘I am quite willing to make haste,’ I replied, ‘but what am I to do?’

“But she only laughed, and replied:  ’Don’t you understand, you great knowing fellow?’

“I was no nearer her meaning, I give you my word of honor, Captain, but she came and sat down by me, and said: 

“’If you mention this to anyone, I will have you put in prison, so swear that you will never open your lips about it.’

“I swore whatever she liked, though I did not at all understand what she meant, and my forehead was covered with perspiration, so I took my pocket-handkerchief out of my helmet, and she took it and wiped my brow with it; then she kissed me, and whispered:  ‘Then you will?’ ’I will do anything you like, Madame,’ I replied, ‘as that is what I came for.’

“Then she made herself clearly understood by her actions, and when I saw what it was, I put my helmet onto a chair, and showed her that in the dragoons a man never retires, Captain.

“Not that I cared much about it, for she was certainly not in her prime, but it is no good being too particular in such a matter, as ten francs are scarce, and then I have relations whom I like to help, and I said to myself:  ‘There will be five francs for my father, out of that.’

“When I had done my allotted task, Captain, I got ready to go, though she wanted me to stop longer, but I said to her: