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Updated: June 14, 2025
He wrote explanations to the officer left in charge at Sidi-bel-Abbés, the man to whom he must report; but no letter could reach DeLisle for many weeks. He was entertained as the Agha's guest, being introduced to Tahar Ben Hadj and several caids invited for the bridegroom's part of the festivities.
"I'll write to Sidi-bel-Abbés and explain. It's all I can do," was the thought which ran through his head as he politely informed the Agha that he would, at any cost, wait for Mademoiselle DeLisle. "May I see her and deliver in person a letter I have from her father?" he asked.
No recruits were taken: disappointment for Max and despair for Valdez. He had hoped everything from that chance, and, in his rage at losing it, made a dash for liberty from Sidi-bel-Abbés. He got no farther than the outskirts, the forbidden Village Négre, where he risked a night visit in search of the man bribed to hide a certain precious bundle.
Some were almost middle aged; some were youths hardly yet at the regulation enlistment age of eighteen; a few one might take for broken-down gentlemen; more who looked like workmen out of a job, and one or two unmistakably old soldiers, eager-eyed as lost dogs who had found their way home: a strange gathering of individuals to find stumbling out of a freight train at a country station of a French colony; but this was Sidi-bel-Abbés, headquarters of La Legion Etrangére: and as the tired, dirty men tumbled out on to the platform, everybody stared openly as a corporal with a high képi, a buttoned-back blue overcoat, and loose, red trousers tucked into military boots, formed the crew into lines of four.
In Algeria old "Four Eyes" was working for him like the demon that he looked; having returned with his colonel and comrades to Sidi-bel-Abbés after the long march and a satisfactory fight with the "Deliverer," he soon received news of the lost one. With roars of derision he refused to believe in the little "corporal's" voluntary desertion, and from the first moment began to agitate.
Max would have hurried Sanda out directly behind them, before the crowd could secure all the queer, old-fashioned cabs which were waiting, but at that moment the smart group of officers moved forward. Having shown their guest one of the sights of Sidi-bel-Abbés, they evidently expected to take precedence of the townspeople, who gave no sign of disputing their right.
"But but I don't see what's to be done," he said, "Mademoiselle DeLisle's father, my colonel, ordered me to take her to Sidi-bel-Abbés." "Not ordered; asked!" the girl cut in with an unfairness that hurt. "All the blame is mine," Stanton assured him with a warm friendliness of manner. "My shoulders are broad enough to bear it. And you know, St. George, your colonel and I are old friends.
These, and the lounging Arabs, might have interested strangers to Sidi-bel-Abbés, if there had been nothing better worth attention. But owing to the lateness of the train, it had come in almost simultaneously with another made up of windowless wagons for men, horses or freight, which had not yet discharged its load.
He agreed with Sanda that it would be Quixotic, in the circumstances, to go back to Sidi-bel-Abbés. "You'd be a damn fool, my boy," he said emphatically, "to go and offer yourself a lamb for the sacrifice!" It did not occur to him that Max was offering himself on the altar of another temple of sacrifice.
I was going to Sidi-bel-Abbés to be with strangers till my father came. And even at best, though he loves me, I am a burden and a worry to him. Then, suddenly, comes this glorious joy! My Knight, my one Sir Knight, wants me, and cares! If I knew I were going straight to death, I'd go just the same, and just as joyously."
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