When Gabrielle made her appearance the next night an ear-splitting noise of hooting and catcalls rose from the officers' seats. Roger, who had purposely placed himself near the roisterers, got up and harangued the noisiest in such scathing language that the whole of their fury was soon turned on himself. He then drew his notebook from his pocket, and, with the utmost _sang-froid_, wrote down the names cried out to him from all sides; he would have arranged to fight with the whole regiment if a great many naval officers had not come up, out of loyalty to their order, and taken part against his adversaries. The hubbub was something frightful. The whole garrison was confined for several days, but when we regained liberty, there was a terrible score to settle. There were threescore of us at the rendez-vous. Roger, alone, fought three officers in succession; he pilled one, and badly wounded the other two without receiving a scratch. I, as luck would have it, came off less fortunately; a cursed lieutenant, who had been a fencing master, gave me a neat thrust through the chest which nearly finished me. The duel, or rather battle, was a fine sight, I can tell you. The naval officers had gained the victory, and the regiment was obliged to leave Brest. You may guess that our superior officers did not overlook the author of the quarrel. They placed a guard outside his door for a fortnight. When his term of arrest was over I came out of hospital and went to see him. Judge my surprise when I entered his room and found him sitting at breakfast tête-à-tête with Gabrielle. They seemed to have been on friendly terms for some time, and already called each other thee and thou, and drank out of the same glass. Roger introduced me to his mistress as his dearest friend, and told her I had been wounded in the slight skirmish on her behalf. This charming young girl then condescended to kiss me, for all her sympathies were with fighters. They spent three months together in perfect happiness, and never left each other for a moment. Gabrielle seemed to love him to distraction, and Roger declared that he had never known love before he met Gabrielle.