The Wages of Virtue Part 13

"Fancy them 'eathens pinchin' the toon like that," commented 'Erb.

"They oughtn't to be allowed... Do they 'old concerts 'ere? I dessay they'd like to 'ear some good Henglish songs...."

Reginald Rupert never forgot his first glimpse of the Canteen of the Legion, though he entered it hundreds of times and spent hundreds of hours beneath its corrugated iron roof. Scores of Legionaries, variously clad in blue and red or white sat on benches at long tables, or lounged at the long zinc-covered bar, behind which were Madame and hundreds of bottles and large wine-gla.s.ses.

Madame la Vivandiere de la Legion was not of the school of "Cigarette."

Rupert failed to visualise her with any clearness as leading a cavalry charge (the _Drapeau_ of La France in one hand, a pistol in the other, and her reins in her mouth), inspiring Regiments, advising Generals, softening the cruel hearts of Arabs, or "saving the day" for La Patrie, in the manner of the vivandiere of fiction. Madame had a beady eye, a perceptible moustache, a frankly downy chin, two other chins, a more than ample figure, and looked, what she was, a female camp-sutler.

Perhaps Madame appeared more Ouidaesque on the march, wearing her official blue uniform as duly const.i.tuted and appointed _fille du regiment_. At present she looked... However, the bow of Reginald Rupert, together with his smile and honeyed words, were those of Mayfair, as he was introduced by Madame's admired friend ce bon Jean Boule, and he stepped straight into Madame's experienced but capacious heart. Nor was the brightness of the image dulled by the ten-franc piece which he tendered with the request that Madame would supply the party with her most blushful Hippocrene. 'Erb, being introduced, struck an att.i.tude, his hand upon his heart. Madame coughed affectedly.

"Makes a noise like a 'igh-cla.s.s parlour-maid bein' jilted, don' she?"

he observed critically.

Having handed a couple of bottles and a large gla.s.s to each member of the party, by way of commencement in liquidating the coin, she returned to her confidential whispering with Monsieur le Legionnaire Luigi Rivoli (who lolled, somewhat drunk, in a corner of the bar) as the group seated itself at the end of a long table near the window.

It being "holiday," that is, pay-day, the Canteen was full, and most of its patrons had contrived to emulate it. A very large number had laid out the whole of their _decompte_--every farthing of two-pence halfpenny--on wine. Others, wiser and more continent, had reserved a halfpenny for tobacco. In one corner of the room an impromptu German glee party was singing with such excellence that the majority of the drinkers were listening to them with obvious appreciation. With hardly a break, and with the greatest impartiality they proceeded from part-song to hymn, from hymn to drinking-song, from drinking-song to sentimental love-ditty. Finally _Ein feste burg ist unser Gott_ being succeeded by _Die Wacht am Rhein_ and _Deutschland uber Alles_, the French element in the room thought that a little French music would be a pleasing corrective, and with one accord, if not in one key, gave a spirited rendering of the Ma.r.s.eillaise, followed by--

"Tiens, voila du boudin Tiens, voila du boudin Tiens, voia du boudin Pour les Alsaciens, les Suisses, et les Lorraines, Four les Belges il n'y en a plus Car ce sont des tireurs du flanc..." etc.,

immediately succeeded by--

"As-tu vu la casquette La casquette Du Pere Bougeaud," etc.

As the ditty came to a close a blue-jowled little Parisian--quick, nervous, and alert--sprang on to a table, and with a bottle in one hand, and a gla.s.s in the other, burst into the familiar and favourite--

"C'est l'empereur de Danemark Qui a dit a sa moitie Depuis quelqu' temps je remarque Que tu sens b'en fort les pieds..." etc.

"C'est la reine Pomare Qui a pour tout tenue Au milieu de l'ete..."

the song being brought to an untimely end by reason of the parties on either side of the singer's table entering into a friendly tug-of-war with his feet as rope-ends. As he fell, amid howls of glee and the cras.h.i.+ng of gla.s.s, the Bucking Bronco remarked to Rupert--

"Gwine ter be some rough-housin' ter-night ef we're lucky," but ere the melee could become general, Madame la Cantiniere, descending from her throne behind the bar, bore down upon the rioters and rated them soundly--imbeciles, fools, children, vauriens, and _sales cochons_ that they were. Madame was well aware of the fact that a conflagration should be dealt with in its earliest stages and before it became general.

"This is really extraordinarily good wine," remarked Rupert to John Bull.

"Yes," replied the latter. "It's every bit as good at three-halfpence a bottle as it is at three-and-six in England, and I'd advise you to stick to it and let absinthe alone. It does one no harm, in reason, and is a great comfort. It's our greatest blessing and our greatest curse.

Absinthe is pure curse--and inevitably means 'cafard.'"

"What is this same 'cafard' of which one hears so much?" asked Rupert.

"Well, the word itself means 'beetle,' I believe, and sooner or later the man who drinks absinthe in this climate feels the beetle crawling round and round in his brain. He then does the maddest things and ascribes the impulse to the beetle. He finally goes mad and generally commits murder or suicide, or both. That is one form of _cafard_, and the other is mere fed-upness, a combination of liverish temper, boredom and utter hatred and loathing of the terrible ennui of the life."

"Have you had it?" asked the other.

"Everyone has it at times," was the reply, "especially in the tiny desert-stations where the awful heat, monotony, and lack of employment leave one the choice of drink or madness. If you drink you're certain to go mad, and if you don't drink you're sure to. Of course, men like ourselves--educated, intelligent, and all that--have more chance than the average 'Tommy' type, but it's very dangerous for the highly strung excitable sort. He's apt to go mad and stay mad. We only get fits of it."

"Don't the authorities do anything to amuse and employ the men in desert stations, like we do in India?" enquired the younger man.

"Absolutely nothing. They prohibit the _Village Negre_ in every station, compel men to lie on their cots from eleven till four, and do nothing at all to relieve the maddening monotony of drill, sentry-go and punishment. On the other hand, _cafard_ is so recognised an inst.i.tution that punishments for offences committed under its influence are comparatively light. It takes different people differently, and is sometimes comic--though generally tragic."

"I should think you're bound to get something of the sort wherever men lead a very hard and very monotonous life, in great heat," said Rupert.

"Oh yes," agreed John Bull. "After all _le cafard_ is not the private and peculiar speciality of the Legion. We get a very great deal of madness of course, but I think it's nearly as much due to predisposition as it is to the hard monotonous life.... You see we are a unique collection, and a considerable minority of us must be more or less queer in some way, or they wouldn't be here."

Rupert wondered why the speaker was "here" but refrained from asking.

"Can you cla.s.sify the recruits at all clearly?" he asked.

"Oh yes," was the reply. "The bulk of them are here simply and solely for a living; hungry men who came here for board and lodging. Thousands of foreigners in France have found themselves down on their uppers, with their last sou gone, fairly on their beam-ends and their room-rent overdue. To such men the Foreign Legion offers a home. Then, again, thousands of soldiers commit some heinous military 'crime' and desert to the Foreign Legion to start afresh. We get most of our Germans and Austrians that way, and not a few French who pretend to be Belgians to avoid awkward questions as to their papers. We get Alsatians by the hundred of course, too. It is their only chance of avoiding service under the hated German. They fight for France, and by their five years'

Legion-service earn the right to naturalisation also. There are a good many French, too, who are 'rehabilitating' themselves. Men who have come to grief at home and prefer the Legion to prison. Then there is undoubtedly a wanted-by-the-police cla.s.s of men who have bolted from all parts of Europe and taken sanctuary here. Yes, I should say the out-of-works, deserters, runaways and Alsatians make up three parts of the Legion."

"And what is the other part?"

"Oh, keen soldiers who have deliberately chosen the Legion for its splendid military training and constant fighting experience--romantics who have read vain imaginings and figments of the female mind like 'Under Two Flags'; and the queerest of Queer Fish, oddments and remnants from the ends of the earth...." A shout of "Ohe, Gra.s.shopper!" caused him to turn.

In the doorway, crouching on his heels, was the man they had left lying on the settee at Carmelita's. Emitting strange chirruping squeaks, turning his head slowly from left to right, and occasionally brus.h.i.+ng it from back to front with the sides of his "forelegs," the Gra.s.shopper approached with long, hopping bounds.

"And that was once an ornament of Chancelleries and Courts," said John Bull, as he rose to his feet. "Poor devil! Got his _cafard_ once and for all at An Sefra. There was a big gra.s.shopper or locust in his _gamelle_ of soup one day.... I suppose he was on the verge at the moment. Anyhow, he burst into tears and has been a gra.s.shopper ever since, except when he's a j.a.p or something of that sort.... He's a gra.s.shopper when he's 'normal' you might say."

Going over to where the man squatted, the old Legionary took him by the arm. "Come and sit on my blade of gra.s.s and drink some dew, Cigale,"

said he.

Smiling up brightly at the face which he always recognised as that of a sympathetic friend, the Gra.s.shopper arose and accompanied John Bull to the end of the long table at which sat the Englishmen, the Russians, and the American....

Yet more wine had made 'Erb yet more expansive, and he kindly filled his gla.s.s and placed it before the Gra.s.shopper.

"'Ere drink that hup, Looney, an' I'll sing yer a song as'll warm the c.o.c.kles o' yer pore ol' 'eart," he remarked, and suiting the action to the word, rose to his feet and, lifting up his voice, delivered himself mightily of that song not unknown to British barrack-rooms--

"A German orficer crossin' the Rhine 'E come to a pub, an' this was the sign Skibooo, skibooo, Skibooo, skiana, skibooo."

The raucous voice and unwonted British accents (for Englishmen are rare in the Legion) attracted some attention, and by the time 'Erb had finished with the German officer and commenced upon "'Oo's that aknockin' on the dawer," he was well across the footlights and had the ear and eye of the a.s.sembly. Finding himself the cynosure of not only neighbouring but distant eyes, 'Erb mounted the table and "obliged" with a clog-dance and "double-shuffle-breakdown" to the huge delight of an audience ever desiring a new thing. Stimulated by rounds of applause, and by the cheers and laughter which followed the little Parisian's cry of "Vive le G.o.ddam biftek Anglais," 'Erb burst into further Barrack-room Ballads unchronicled by, and probably quite unknown to, Mr. Kipling, and did not admit the superior claims of private thirst until he had dealt faithfully with "The Old Monk," "The Doctor's Boy," and the indiscreet adventure of Abraham the Sailor with the Beautiful Miss Taylor....

"Some boy, that _com_patriot o' yourn, John," remarked the Bucking Bronco, "got a reg'lar drorin' room repertory, ain't 'e?" and the soul of 'Erb was proud within him, and he drank another pint of wine.

"Nutthink like a little--_hic_--'armony," he admitted modestly, "fer making a _swarry_ sociable an' 'appy. Wot I ses is--_hic_--wot I ses is--_hic_--wot I ses is--_hic_...."

"It is so, sonny, and that's almighty solemn truth," agreed the Bucking Bronco.

"Wot I ses is--_hic_--" doggedly repeated 'Erb.

"Right again, sonny.... He knows what 'e's sayin' all right," observed the American, turning to the Russians.

"Wot I ses is--_hic_--" repeated 'Erb dogmatically....

"'_Hic jacet!_' Monsieur would say, perhaps?" suggested Feodor.

'Erb turned upon the last speaker with an entirely kindly contempt.

"Don't yer igspose yer _hic_-norance," he advised. "You're a foreiller.