Page:Christopher Wren--the wages of virtue.djvu/45

Rh I. A wayside flow'ret, a retiring primrose, such as you English love."

"Then, cher Malvin, since you seek soap and not sorrow, let not my little cake of soap disappear from beneath the polishing-rags in my sack. The little brown sack at the head of my cot, cher Malvin. Enfin! I appoint you guardian and custodian of my little cake of soap. But in a most evil hour for le bon M. Malvin would it disappear. Guard it then, cher Malvin. Respect it. Watch over it as you value, and would retain, your health and beauty, M. Malvin. And when I have avenged my little piece of soap, the true history of the last ten minutes will deeply interest those earnest searchers after truth, Legionaries Schnitzel and Dupont. Depart in peace and enter upon your new office of Guardian of my Soap! Vous devez en être joliment fier."

"Quite a speech, in effect, mon drôle," replied the stout Austrian as he doubtfully fingered his short beard au poinçon, and added uneasily, "I am not the only gentleman who 'decorates' himself with soap."

"No? Nor with uniforms. Go in peace, Protector of my Soap."

And smiling wintrily M. Malvin winked, broke into the wholly deplorable ditty of "Pére Dupanloup en chemin de fer," and pursued his innocent path to barracks, whither Sir Montague Merline later followed him, after watching with a contemptuous smile some mixed and messy fighting (beside the apparently dead body of the Legionary Schnitzel) between an Alsatian and an Italian, in which the Italian kicked his opponent in the stomach and partly ate his ear,