Chapter 8 - Page 2

Of course, we had our own little troubles to make us bitter, as
well as the wrongs of our Emperor. There were many of us who had
held high rank and would hold it again if he came back to his
own. We had not found it possible to take service under the
white flag of the Bourbons, or to take an oath which might turn
our sabres against the man whom we loved. So we found ourselves
with neither work nor money. What could we do save gather
together and gossip and grumble, while those who had a little
paid the score and those who had nothing shared the bottle? Now
and then, if we were lucky, we managed to pick a quarrel with one
of the Garde du Corps, and if we left him on his hack in the Bois
we felt that we had struck a blow for Napoleon once again. They
came to know our haunts in time, and they avoided them as if they
had been hornets' nests.

There was one of these--the Sign of the Great Man --in the Rue
Varennes, which was frequented by several of the more
distinguished and younger Napoleonic officers. Nearly all of us
had been colonels or aides- de-camp, and when any man of less
distinction came among us we generally made him feel that he had
taken a liberty. There were Captain Lepine, who had won the
medal of honour at Leipzig; Colonel Bonnet, aide-de-camp to
Macdonald; Colonel Jourdan, whose fame in the army was hardly
second to my own; Sabbatier of my own Hussars, Meunier of the Red
Lancers, Le Breton of the Guards, and a dozen others.

Every night we met and talked, played dominoes, drank a glass or
two, and wondered how long it would be before the Emperor would
be back and we at the head of our regiments once more. The
Bourbons had already lost any hold they ever had upon the
country, as was shown a few years afterward, when Paris rose
against them and they were hunted for the third time out of
France. Napoleon had but to show himself on the coast, and he
would have marched without firing a musket to the capital,
exactly as he had done when he came back from Elba.

Well, when affairs were in this state there arrived one night in
February, in our cafe, a most singular little man. He was short
but exceedingly broad, with huge shoulders, and a head which was
a deformity, so large was it. His heavy brown face was scarred
with white streaks in a most extraordinary manner, and he had
grizzled whiskers such as seamen wear. Two gold earrings in his
ears, and plentiful tattooing upon his hands and arms, told us
also that he was of the sea before he introduced himself to us as
Captain Fourneau, of the Emperor's navy. He had letters of
introduction to two of our number, and there could be no doubt
that he was devoted to the cause. He won our respect, too, for
he had seen as much