"Don’t worry, pal!.. Don’t worry!”.. that’s how he used to talk to me.. "We’ll never come back here again!. Just wait’ll you see London!.. You’ll get a hell of a lift!.. Wait’ll I’m out on convalescence!” It was really swell of him.
I was being nicely encouraged along the sores and sutures.. and I was getting my share of them!.. Please believe me.. Then crash!.. it all collapsed!.. One morning they come asking for Raoul Farcy!.. He’d been in another ward having his wound dressed and was on his way back.. The military police want him and take him away!.. handcuffs!..
"Where are you going?” I blurt it out!.. "Down with the cops!” he yells to me.. "Down with the cops!”.. right in front of the whole hospital.. and he reminds me from way across the room.. with the cops dragging him.. "Cascade! you hear!.. Cascade!.. Don’t crap around! Down with the cops!”.. Those were his words!.. the last I heard.. That same evening we learned the rest.. Court-martialed!.. They let him have it two days later!.. Raoul Farcy.. self-inflicted wound!.. 2nd African!.. Maybe it was true, maybe it wasn’t!
.. They do as they like!.. They don’t worry too much.. A detachment came up, convalescents from the hospital, they marched in front of his body.. They shot him at dawn, in the courtyard, the Barnabe courtyard, the name of the military prison. He didn’t break down. "Down with the cops! ” he yelled at them as they fired. That’s the story.
Ah! that really made me feel bad.. Not much affects me.. Me, a little chump by birth, son of my parents, working people, submissive, decent, good-natured… he’d taught me a thing or two, opened my eyes, I missed him, got to admit it.. Raoul… he wasn’t much when it came to writing… I wrote everything for him.. with my left hand… I was the one who always wrote to London, to his Uncle Cascade.. Cascade Farcy.. two letters a week.. Cascade Farcy, Leicester Street… it was all settled.. He was expecting both of us.. absolutely, fully agreed!.. We were supposed to get leave at the same time, we were married there.. both of us.. to English girls! all phony!.. and with papers, licenses, everything!.. Everything was attended to.. fixed up! nice and faked! and then crash!.. Raoul! some break!.. With me just getting a little better… I didn’t die, after all.. Shit! Tough luck!.. I recovered… I wrote to his uncle! Cascade Farcy, Leicester Street…
"Come! ” he wrote right back.. "Come, I want to talk to you!” And he knew me only from the letters!.. Ah! I was scared about Raoul. I was so panicky I was pissing in my pants!.. He’d disgusted me with the army!.. "Don’t go home! ” he’d also yelled at the last moment.. "They’ll nab you!.. Just take a look!.. They’re sweeping out the crumbs!”… He meant himself..
"Go to London!.. Don’t forget Cascade! ”… Ah! those were his very words!.. They haunted me! his last words!..
That pulled me through!.. I was stubborn… "Come!.. Come!”.. All I thought about was London!.. Then the three months of convalescence.. Ah! no cold feet, I shipped off. I’m invited! I take advantage! the right moment! luck!
I arrive!.. Ah! a nice atmosphere!.. Ah! real brothers… pals to the death.. those are the words for it!. Cascade asks me for news right away… I explain to Cascade about Raoul.. Boy, it knocked him over!.. He made me explain it at least ten times in a row!.. He didn’t believe it!.. He never got tired of my explanation!.. had to start all over!.. then again!.. he really loved him like a son!.. Raoul Farcy… it staggered him!.. That was my arrival in London!. providential circumstances.. my luck to have known Raoui, poor Raoul, and his Uncle Cascade..
I tell my story to the Chinaman, sitting on the curb. I wanted him to know all about it… it did me good.
"Now you know what’s happened to me!.. It’s your turn now!.. Tell me your story!.. I’ll tell you the rest later on!
I’ve got lots left!.. I can’t tell you everything all at once!
.. just falling on your head that way!.. in confidence!”
Ah! it sure was funny!.. Time out for a laugh!
"You realize,” I add, "that he’d have liked to hand everything over to Raoul. the whole works… all his business. the entire Leicester. He’d have gone off to the Midi, that was Cascade’s plan… to grow daisies. that was what he had in mind.. The Leicester’s no joke! overworking day and night.. needs quite a guy to keep it going!.. It’s like running an army!”
My Chinaman didn’t answer.
Ah! it was getting annoying.
"Say, guy! You don’t talk much!” I said.. "You’re not going to double-cross me maybe?”
The little stinker suddenly got me worried. Had I talked too much?
"Oh! don’t worry, young man!. I’m far too concerned with my personal enterprises! I’ve got other things on my mind than making trouble for you!.. I’m no longer a child! Perhaps you’ve noticed it!.. A plaything of passion!.. A victim of enthusiasms! Thank God! I’m no longer a spring chicken! Young, effervescent! not an acrobat whisking hither and yon! God no! Rubbish!.. Be careful! Don’t be contemptuous! Clothes make the man! ”
My phony Chinaman was starting to strut.
"You were speaking of quality! well, well! a while ago!.. Regarding those poor people!.. You don’t have the slightest idea. I understood at once!.. You’ll learn to know me!.. Perhaps!”
And the little superior smile..
"I don’t want to intimidate you!.. Oh! no intention!.. To dazzle you with my scientific and noble titles!.. Certainly not!
Weakness!.. An old man’s weakness you’re thinking! ”… He was meditating.. "What will you do with your opportunity, young man?.. You’re a hero, it seems.. so you claim!
Hm! A war hero!. An easy prey!.. A heroic plaything!
.. A child!”
I’d annoyed him.
"At your age everything is permissible!.. Valor! Valor!.. As for me, and don’t forget it, I’ve other fish to fry than to go rushing under tanks!.. I’ve been through all the ordeals!.. All!..The war is merely fireworks! Life is short!..An amusement!.. What remains of it?”.. He whispers into my ear.. "Nothing, eh?”
He’s enjoying the effect… He brushes away my whole confession with a flip of his hand..
"In short, you teach me nothing!”
The windbag.
"Listen to me! You have everything to learn! Are you in-itiable?”
Initiable?
"Just what am I?.. Don’t you know?.. I attract you.. You entrust me with your secrets? Is it my robe?.. Are you captivated by my fluid?.. so soon?”
I look idiotic.
"A Frenchman! indeed I am! Be careful!.. And of good stock! I flatter myself! But without boasting! And that’s how it is! a just pride!.. But initiated! That’s another matter! Ah! that’s the heart of it! I’ve done much for my country!.. An explorer, my young friend!.. An explorer.. Must I die?.. Look at my costume!.. Initiated, young man!.. Initiated!” He comes closer, he whispers it to me.. eagerly! rattling away!..
"Tibet! Ah, Tibet! I dreamed of it.. Yes!.. I dreamed of it!.. I admit… a grave crime… at the first calls of the horn!
.. In the riflery, young man.. Riflery!.. Reserve officer!.. to go back into service!.. in my fifty-seventh year!.. You’ll see it on my record. to run and offer myself to Gallieni..
I knew him!.. At the Polytechnic!.. And then.. then I thought it over.. I’ve got better things to do! with my gifts!
.. my work! my labors!.. to perish just at that moment when the darkness is rent asunder?.. You’ll know later on!.. Trivial duty!.. it would be suicide!.. and what a suicide!.. Perhaps you'll learn about it some day. Be careful!. down to business!.. this is me! ”
He hands me his card.
HERVE SOSTHENE DE RODIENCOURT