"You speak madly," he said, with cold brevity. "The offense merits the
chastisement. I shall not attempt to interfere."
"Wait! You will hear, at least, Monsieur?"
"I will hear you--yes, but I tell you, once for all, I never change
sentences that are pronounced by councils of war; and this crime is the
last for which you should attempt to plead for mercy with me."
"Hear me, at least!" she cried, with passionate ferocity--the ferocity
of a dumb animal wounded by a shot. "You do not know what this man
is--how he has had to endure; I do. I have watched him; I have seen the
brutal tyranny of his chief, who hated him because the soldiers loved
him. I have seen his patience, his obedience, his long-suffering beneath
insults that would have driven any other to revolt and murder. I have
seen him--I have told you how--at Zaraila, thinking never of death or
life, only of our Flag, that he has made his own, and under which he has
been forced to lead the life of a galley slave--"
"The finer soldier he be, the less pardonable his offense."
"That I deny! If he were a dolt, a brute, a thing of wood as many are,
he would have no right to vengeance; as it is, he is a gentleman, a
hero, a martyr; may he not forget for one hour that he is a slave?
Look you! I have seen him so tried that I told him--I, who love my army
better than any living thing under the sun--that I would forgive him if
he forgot duty and dealt with his tyrant as man to man.
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