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He stood for a moment at the wicket-gate, and then opening it passed through, suffering it to fall with a clatter behind him. His hand trembled strangely as he lifted it to the door, and he knocked with a tremulous loudness. When he had waited for a time he heard Rachel's footsteps tapping on the oil-cloth of the passage which divided her toy sitting-room from her bandbox of a parlor.
It was crowded with men, a few women scattered here and there, most of the former in shirt-sleeves, all eating silently. A few smaller tables at the back of the room were distinguished from the others by white coverings in place of oil-cloth, evidently reserved for the more distinguished guests.
Notwithstanding his town-visitor and the fact that it was Sunday, he came to dinner in a dirty, sweaty, collarless shirt, and I, sitting at his oil-cloth covered table, slipped back, deeper, ever deeper among the stern realities of the life from which I had emerged.
I recognized at the first glance the long gray cloaks which we had received on the 22d of October, on the glacis at Erfurth; they had become quite green from the snow and wind and rain. It was worse than after the battle of Leipzig. The old shakos were full of ball holes, only the flag was new, in its beautiful case of oil-cloth, with the fleur-de-lis at the end.
Within, the house was spotlessly clean with that characteristic German house odour which always seems to be a compound of cleaning material and hot grease. Up a narrow staircase, furnished in plain oil-cloth with brass stair-rods, they went to a landing on the first floor. Here the woman motioned them back and, bending her head in a listening attitude, knocked.
At cloud-line, the rocks were slippery as glass from moisture, and Mackenzie led the way, beating the drip from the branches as they marched. The record was twelve miles the first day. When it rained, the shelter was a piece of oil-cloth held up in an extemporized tent, the men crouching to sleep as best they could.
My boy had such a cap, with a silk oil-cloth cover, but his splendor was marred by his short hair. At one time boots with long, sharp-pointed toes were the fashion, and he so ardently desired a pair of these that fate granted his prayer, but in the ironical spirit which fate usually shows when granting a person's prayers.
"Now, if you'll reach into that box behind you and get the potatoes," he said, "I'll do the rest of the fixin's." He removed his hat, and taking down a big oil-cloth apron, checked red and black, tied it about his ample waist. He reached up and drew from behind the clock a pair of spectacles in steel bows. He adjusted them to his blue eyes with a little frown.
Each mess generally owned a frying pan, but often one served a company. The oil-cloth was found to be as good as the wooden tray for making up the dough. The water bucket held its own to the last! Tents were rarely seen. All the poetry about the "tented field" died. Two men slept together, each having a blanket and an oil-cloth; one oil-cloth went next to the ground.
I now went to his house daily at six o'clock in the evening, and always experienced a secret pleasure when the outer door closed behind me, and I had to thread the long, dark cloister-passage. We sat in his library, at a table covered with oil-cloth, a much-read Lucian never quitting his side.
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