should have been food for worms in a trice, so I kept my place.



XXVI

THE SECRET OF THE TAPESTRY


That evening, at eight o'clock, Jean Labrouk was buried. A
shell had burst not a dozen paces from his own door, within the
consecrated ground of the cathedral, and in a hole it had made he
was laid, the only mourners his wife and his grandfather, and two
soldiers of his company sent by General Bougainville to bury him.
I watched the ceremony from my loft, which had one small dormer
window. It was dark, but burning buildings in the Lower Town made
all light about the place. I could hear the grandfather mumbling
and talking to the body as it was lowered into the ground. While
yet the priest was hastily reading prayers, a dusty horseman came
riding to the grave, and dismounted.

"Jean," he said, looking at the grave, "Jean Labrouk, a man dies
well that dies with his gaiters on, aho! ... What have you said
for Jean Labrouk, m'sieu'?" he added to the priest.

The priest stared at him, as though he had presumed.

"Well?" said Gabord. "Well?"

The priest answered nothing, but prepared to go, whispering a