"Why don't you answer?" he cried; "what have you got to say, dirty swine that you are! I suppose you belong to the class of youngsters who are proud to be seen in the company of _cocottes_, and afterwards leave those ladies to settle the bill for them." This I confess was too much for me, but still determined to outwardly restrain my temper, I took two steps towards the Major, and crossing my arms on my chest, looked him straight in the eyes. "I have let you insult me, sir," I said slowly, "in order to see how far you would go. The ladies of whom you have just spoken are, I know, far above your contempt, and it strikes me that if they had cared to accept your senile advances, you would probably have thought them most divine creatures. I need not defend them, they are too well known to require such defence," I continued, mentioning their names. "As for myself," I went on, "you have accused me of playing the basest part a man can play in this world. It was not through respect for the gold stripes you wear on your sleeve that I kept silent, but through respect for your white hairs. In a few months' time I shall no longer be a Dragoon, and I hope that in a few years I shall be somebody, while you will be--yourself: nothing else but one of the mass of retired Majors whose intelligence and means will limit them to a glass of absinthe, and a game of dominoes before dinner, and the company of a local bailiff, or the constable of their native village. You called me a _maquereau_ just now, and you seem to be so well acquainted with the habits of that class, that I can only conclude that you gained that knowledge personally at a time when nature made you more attractive than you are now." The Major, who had been too dumbfounded to answer a word so far, turned pale when I uttered those words, and, seizing his riding-whip, which lay on the table, lifted it as though about to strike me, shouting at the same time, in a voice choked with rage, "_Misérable!_" I wrenched the whip from his hands, and replacing it on the table stood once more at "Attention." "I will court-martial you," went on the Major; "you shall have ten years for this!" "I may or may not, sir," I replied; "but supposing I am court-martialled, I shall bring witnesses to expose the way in which you behaved in the train yesterday, and you may regret the step you have taken. As to our present conversation there is only your word against mine, but I suppose that being only a trooper my word will stand for nothing; still, as I told you before, think well over the matter before you do anything rash." The Major said nothing, but went on feverishly pacing up and down the room, he at last stopped, and sat down at the table.