United States or Ukraine ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
First, there was the question of wood; fortunately a laborer, who had been repairing the road, had gone home and left his wheelbarrow behind him; Lapoulle quickly reduced it to fragments with the heel of his boot. Then there was no water to be had that was fit to drink; the hot sunshine had dried up all the pools of rain-water.
Gaude immediately gave the call for "distribution," and Jean had to run for it, for the corporal was steward-in-chief, and it behooved him to be on the lookout to protect his men's interests. He had taken Lapoulle with him, and in a quarter of an hour they returned with some ribs of beef and a bundle of firewood.
Just listen to the bloody fool, saying he is at Angouleme!" It was impossible to extract any explanation from Lapoulle. He had insisted that morning that the uhlans that they sighted were some of Bazaine's troops. Then darkness descended on the camp, black as ink, silent as death.
Lapoulle laughed over it as if he would split his sides, while Chouteau and the others, without expressing the faintest doubt, chuckled at the idea that soon they would be picking up Prussians as boys pick up sparrows in a field after a hail-storm. But they laughed loudest at old Bismarck's accident; oh! the zouaves and the turcos, they were the boys for one's money!
"Ah, if we only had a good big loaf of bread!" sighed Lapoulle, whose ravenous appetite made hunger a more grievous affliction to him than to the others. But Lieutenant Rochas, passing by just then, made them be silent. It was scandalous, never to think of anything but their stomachs! When he was hungry he tightened up the buckle of his trousers.
"See here," Loubet said mysteriously to Lapoulle, with a view to raise a laugh at the expense of his simple-minded comrade, "when you see a bullet coming toward you you must raise your forefinger before your nose like that; it divides the air, and the bullet will go by to the right or left." "But I can't see them," said Lapoulle. A loud guffaw burst from those near.
The poor brute's cries were almost human in their accent of terror and distress; he struggled desperately to shake off his assailants, and would have broken them like a reed had he not been half dead with inanition. The movements of his head prevented the blows from taking effect; Lapoulle was unable to despatch him. "Nom de Dieu! how hard his bones are! Hold him, somebody, until I finish him."
We'll learn whether he dares to stuff himself on the sly, when so many poor devils are starving all around him." "Yes, yes, that's the talk! we'll follow him," Lapoulle angrily declared. "We'll see about it!" He doubled his fists; he was like a crazy man whenever the subject of eating was mentioned in his presence.
What precious liars they must be, to tell us that old Bismarck had been made prisoner and that a German army had been driven over a quarry and dashed to pieces! Oh yes, they fooled us in great shape." Pache and Lapoulle, who were standing near, shook their heads and clenched their fists ominously.
The darkness settled down on them, denser and denser; the chill mists rose from the stream and enshrouded everything in a dank, noisome fog. "Are you asleep, Jean?" Jean was asleep, and Maurice was alone. He could not endure the thought of going to the tent where Lapoulle and the rest of them were slumbering; he heard their snoring, responsive to Rochas' strains, and envied them.
Word Of The Day