The red-hot light of the after-glow still burned on the waters of the bay, and shed its Egyptian-like luster on the city that lies in the circle of the Sahel, with the Mediterranean so softly lashing with its violet waves the feet of the white, sloping town. The sun had sunk down in fire — the sun that once looked over those waters on the legions of Scipio and the iron brood of Hamilcar, and that now gave its luster on the folds of the French flags as they floated above the shipping of the harbor, and on the glitter of the French arms, as a squadron of the army of Algeria swept back over the hills to their barracks. Pell-mell in its fantastic confusion, its incongruous blending, its forced mixture of two races — that will touch, but never mingle; that will be chained together, but will never assimilate — the Gallic–Moorish life of the city poured out; all the coloring of Haroun al Raschid scattered broadcast among Parisian fashion and French routine. Away yonder, on the spurs and tops of the hills, the green sea-pines seemed to pierce the transparent air; in the Cabash old, dreamy Arabian legends, poetic as Hafiz, seem still to linger here and there under the foliage of hanging gardens or the picturesque curves of broken terraces; in the distance the brown, rugged Kabyl mountains lay like a couched camel, and far off against the golden haze a single palm rose, at a few rare intervals, with its drooped, curled leaves, as though to recall, amid the shame of foreign domination, that this was once the home of Hannibal; the Africa that had made Rome tremble.
In the straight, white boulevards, as in the winding ancient streets; under the huge barn-like walls of barracks, as beneath the marvelous mosaics of mosques; the strange bizarre conflict of European and Oriental life spread its panorama. Staff officers, all aglitter with crosses, galloped past; mules, laden with green maize and driven by lean, brown Bedouins, swept past the plate-glass windows of bonbon shops; grave, white-bearded sheiks drank petits verres in the guinguettes; sapeurs, Chasseurs, Zouaves, cantinieres — all the varieties of French military life — mingled with jet-black Soudans, desert kings wrathful and silent, Eastern women shrouded in haick and serroual, eagle-eyed Arabs flinging back snow-white burnous, and handling ominously the jeweled halts of their cangiars. Alcazar chansons rang out from the cafes, while in their midst stood the mosque, that had used to resound with the Muezzin. Bijou-blondine and Bebee La-la and all the sister-heroines of demi-monde dragged their voluminous Paris-made dresses side by side with Moorish beauties, who only dared show the gleam of their bright black eyes through the yashmak; the reverberes were lit in the Place du Gouvernement, and a group fit for the days of Solyman the Magnificent sat under the white marble beauty of the Mohammedan church. “Rein n’est sacre pour un sapeur!” was being sung to a circle of sous-officiers, close in the ear of a patriarch serenely majestic as Abraham; gaslights were flashing, cigar shops were filling, newspapers were being read, the Rigolboche was being danced, commis-voyageurs were chattering with grisettes, drums were beating, trumpets were sounding, bands were playing, and, amid it all, grave men were dropping on their square of carpet to pray, brass trays of sweetmeats were passing, ostrich eggs were dangling, henna-tipped fingers were drawing the envious veil close, and noble Oriental shadows were gliding to and fro through the open doors of the mosques, like a picture of the “Arabian Nights,” like a poem of dead Islamism — in a word, it was Algiers at evening.
In one of the cafes there, a mingling of all the nations under the sun was drinking demi-tasses, absinthe, vermouth, or old wines, in the comparative silence that had succeeded to a song, sung by a certain favorite of the Spahis, known as Loo–Loo-j’n-m’en soucie guere, from Mlle. Loo–Loo’s well-known habits of independence and bravado, which last had gone once so far as shooting a man through the chest in the Rue Bab-alOued, and setting all the gendarmes and sergents-deville at defiance afterward. Half a dozen of that famous regiment the Chasseurs d’Afrique were gathered together, some with their feet resting on the little marble-topped tables, some reading the French papers, all smoking their inseparable companions — the brules-gueles; fine, stalwart, sun-burned fellows, with faces and figures that the glowing colors of their uniform set off to the best advantage.
“Loo–Loo was in fine voice to-night,” said one.
“Yes; she took plenty of cognac before she sang; that always clears her voice,” said a second.
“And I think that did her spirits good, shooting that Kabyl,” said a third. “By the way, did he die?”
“N’sais pas, Loo–Loo’s a good aim.”
“Sac a papier, yes! Rire-pour-tout taught her.”
“Ah! There never was a shot like Rire-pour-tout. When he went out, he always asked his adversary, ‘Where will you like it? your lungs, your heart, your brain? It is quite a matter of choice;’— and whichever they chose, he shot there. Le pauvre Rire-pour-tout! He was always good-natured.”
“And did he never meet his match?” asked a sous-officier of the line.
The speaker looked down on the piou-piou with superb contempt, and twisted his mustaches. “Monsieur! how could he? He was a Chasseur.”
“But if he never met his match, how did he die?” pursued the irreverent piou-piou — a little wiry man, black as a berry, agile as a monkey, tough and short as a pipe-stopper.
The magnificent Chasseur laughed in his splendid disdain. “A piou-piou never killed him, that I promise you. He spitted half a dozen of you before breakfast, to give him a relish. How did Rire-pour-tout die? I will tell you.”
He dipped his long mustaches into a beaker of still champagne. Claude, Viscomte de Chanrellon, though in the ranks, could afford those luxuries.
“He died this way, did Rire-pour-tout! Dieu de Dieu! a very good way too. Send us all the like when our time comes! We were out yonder” (and he nodded his handsome head outward to where the brown, seared plateaux and the Kabyl mountains lay). “We were hunting Arabs, of course — pot-shooting, rather, as we never got nigh enough to their main body to have a clear charge at them. Rire-pour-tout grew sick of it. ‘This won’t do,’ he said; ‘here’s two weeks gone by, and I haven’t shot anything but kites and jackals. I shall get my hand out.’ For Rire-pour-tout, as the army knows, somehow or other, generally potted his man every day, and he missed it terribly. Well, what did he do? He rode off one morning and found out the Arab camp, and he waved a white flag for a parley. He didn’t dismount, but he just faced the Arabs and spoke to their Sheik. ‘Things are slow,’ he said to them. ‘I have come for a little amusement. Set aside six of your best warriors, and I’ll fight them one after another for the honor of France and a drink of brandy to the conqueror.’ They demurred; they thought it unfair to him to have six to one. ‘Ah!’ he laughs, ‘you have heard of Rire-pour-tout, and you are afraid!’ That put their blood up: they said they would fight him before all his Chasseurs. ‘Come, and welcome,’ said Rire-pour-tout; ‘and not a hair of your beards shall be touched except by me.’ So the bargain was made for an hour before sunset that night. Mort de Dieu! that was a grand duel!”
He dipped his long mustaches again into another beaker of still. Talking was thirsty work; the story was well known in all the African army, but the piou-piou, having served in China, was new to the soil.
“The General was ill-pleased when he heard it, and half for arresting Rire-pour-tout; but — sacre! — the thing was done; our honor was involved; he had engaged to fight these men, and engaged for us to let them go in peace afterward; there was no more to be said, unless we had looked like cowards, or traitors, or both. There was a wide, level plateau in front of our camp, and the hills were at our backs — a fine field for the duello; and, true to time, the Arabs filed on to the plain, and fronted us in a long line, with their standards, and their crescents, and their cymbals and reed-pipes, and kettle-drums, all glittering and sounding. Sac a papier! There was a show, and we could not fight one of them! We were drawn up in line — Horse, Foot, and Artillery — Rire-pour-tout all alone, some way in advance; mounted, of course. The General and the Sheik had a conference; then the play began. There were six Arabs picked out — the flower of the army — all white and scarlet, and in their handsomest bravery, as if they came to an aouda. They were fine men — diable! — they were fine men. Now the duel was to be with swords; these had been selected; and each Arab was to come against Rire-pour-tout singly, in succession. Our drums rolled the pas de charge, and their cymbals clashed; they shouted ‘Fantasia!’ and the first Arab rode at him. Rire-pour-tout sat like a rock, and lunge went his steel through the Bedouin’s lung, before you could cry hola! — a death-stroke, of course; Rire-pour-tout always killed: that was his perfect science. Another and another and another came, just as fast as the blood flowed. You know what the Arabs are — vous autres? How they wheel and swerve and fight flying, and pick up their saber from the ground, while their horse is galloping ventre a terre, and pierce you here and pierce you there, and circle round you like so many hawks? You know how they fought Rire-pour-tout then, one after another, more like devils than men. Mort de Dieu! it was a magnificent sight! He was gashed here and gashed there; but they could never unseat him, try how they would; and one after another he caught them sooner or later, and sent them reeling out of their saddles, till there was a great red lake of blood a............