Fable, A - William Faulkner [140]
'And now,' the major said. He turned to the American captain. 'How to say, touche?
'You're out,' the captain said. 'And I wish he was still present so I could hear you say it to him,'
'Bah,' the major said. 'He is a Frenchman. It is only a Bosche marshal that no man can speak to. And now, you're out, from him to me. Because now the wedding and the wine-' and told that-a village behind Montfaucon and only this past winter because they were American troops; they had just been paid, a dice game was going on, the floor littered with franc notes and half the American company crowded around them when the French corporal entered and without a word began to gather up the scattered money; for a time a true international incident was in the making until the corporal finally managed to communicate, explain, what it was about: a wedding: one of the young American soldiers, and a girl, an orphan refugee from somewhere beyond Rhcims, who was now a sort of slavey in the local estaminet; she and the young American had-had-'The rest of his company would say he had knocked her up,' the American captain said. 'But we know what you mean. Go on,' So the major did: the matter ending with the entire company not only attending the wedding but adopting it, taking charge of it, buying up all the wine in the village for the supper and inviting the whole countryside; adopting the marriage too: endowing the bride with a wedding gift sufficient to set up as a lady in her own right, to wait in her own single rented room until-if-her husband returned from his next tour in the lines. But that would be after the old general had left the room; now the three newcomers made way for him as he came around the table and paused and said: 'Tell them. Tell them how he got the medal too. What we seek now is not even extenuation, not even pity, but mercy-if there is such-if he will accept that either,' and turned and went on toward the small door: at which moment it opened and the aide who had taken the prisoner out stood at attention beside it for the old general to pass, then followed and closed the door behind them. 'Yes?' the old general said.
They are in De Montigny's office,' the aide said. The youngest one, the girl, is a Frenchwoman. One of the older ones is the wife of a Frenchman, a farmer-'
'I know,' the old general said. Where is the farm?'
'Was, sir,' the aide said. 'It was near a village called Vienne-la-pucelle, north of St. Mihiel. That country was all evacuated in. On Monday morning Vienne-la-pucelle was under the enemy's front line,'
'Then she and her husband dont know whether they have a farm or not,' the old general said.
'No sir,' the aide said.
'Ah,' the old general said. Then he said again: 'Yes?'
'The motorcar from Villeneuve Blanche has just entered the courtyard,'
'Good,' the old general said. 'My compliments to our guest, and conduct him to my study. Serve his dinner there, and request his permission to receive us in one hour,'
The aide's office had been contrived three years ago by carpen-ters out of-or into-a corner of what had been a ballroom and then a courtroom. The aide saw it each twenty-four hours and obviously even entered it at least once during those periods because on a rack in the corner hung his hat and topcoat and a very fine beautifully-furled London umbrella, in juxtaposition to that hat and that coat as bizarre and paradox as a domino or a fan, until you realised that it could quite well have owed its presence there to the same thing which the only other two objects of any note in the room did: two bronzes which sat at either end of the otherwise completely bare desk-a delicate and furious horse poised weightless and epicene on one leg, and a savage and slumbrous head not cast, molded