'Yes, I am a gentleman. I am
Captain Kasghine. I am a gentleman in allotropic form'; that was as
much as I ever heard him say. He enjoyed cloaking himself in mystery,
he enjoyed the curiosity it drew upon him; but perhaps he had some
remnants of pride, some embers of remorse, some little pain and shame,
as well.
Of the other legends afloat, one ran to the effect that he had
murdered his wife; a second, that he had poisoned the husband of a
lady friend; a third, that he had shown the white feather in battle; a
fourth, that he had cheated at cards. Bibi would neither admit nor
deny any of these imputations, nor would he manifest the faintest
resentment when they were discussed in his presence. He would parry
them, smiling complaisantly: and (if it be considered that they were
all, as it turned out, abominably false) that seems to show better
than anything else to what abysmal depths the man had sunk. Perhaps it
shows also, incidentally, how very heartless and unimaginative young
people in the Latin Quarter used to be. I have seen Bibi swagger; I
have seen him sullen, insolent, sarcastic; I have seen him angry, I
have heard him swear; but anything like honestly indignant I never saw
him.
I remember one night in the Cafe de la Source, when Fil de Fer had
been treating him to brandy and trying to get him to tell his story; I
remember his suddenly turning his one eye in the direction of us men,
and launching himself upon a long flight of rhetoric.
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