The resentment of some of the senior officers at Bonaparte having got them into this situation was still more bitter than that of their juniors, for many of them had made fortunes during the Italian campaign and now they saw no prospect of ever getting back to France to enjoy them. Even Generals such as Lannes, Bessieres and Murat, who owed everything to Bonaparte, criticized him openly in his presence until, on one occasion, he was stung into rounding on them and snapping at the huge mulatto, Dumas:
'Enough of your seditious parleys! Take care that I do not perform my duty. Your six feet of stature shall not save you from being shot.*
Very few officers were prepared to stand up for their General-in-Chief, but among them was the faithful Junot, whom he had picked out when a Seargeant at Toulon and made his very first aide-de-camp. Junot heard one of his brother Generals, Lanusse, make some disparaging remarks about their master and promptly joined issue with him. Murat was also present and, wishing to reconcile them, invited them both to dine with him that day. Bessieres, Lannes, Lavalette, Leclerc, Roger and several other officers were also invited. After dinner they sat down to cards. Junot was the biggest winner and after a time had a pile of gold pieces in front of him. Lanusse, having lost heavily, asked him for the loan of ten louis, upon which Junot replied, ' I'll not lend money to a traitor like you.'
Instantly everyone was on his feet. Lanusse retorted that Junot was a scoundrel. The others endeavoured to pacify them, but it was useless. Although duels were forbidden they insisted on fighting at once, and that it should be a duel to the death.
Lanusse, being the challenged party, had the choice of weapons and chose pistols. It was an insane choice because Junot was the best pistol-shot in the Army and at twenty-five paces could cut a bullet in two on the blade of a knife. With great generosity he refused to fight with pistols and, despite the protests of his friends, insisted that it should be swords.
The palace occupied by Murat had a pleasant garden sloping down to the Nile, and they trooped out there. By then it was nine o'clock and darkness had fallen; so their host tried to stop the duel on the pretext that they could not see well enough for it to be a fair fight. But Lanusse shouted some offensive expressions about Bonaparte, and Lannes cried with an oath, 'Hold your tongue! You're going to cut one another's throats. Isn't that enough? '
Torches were fetched and by their light the two Generals threw off their coats, then sparks flew from their sabres as each tried to cut down the other. The impetuous Junot delivered a stroke that would have killed Lanusse had he not been wearing his hat. As it was, the hat saved his head and the point of the blade laid open only his cheek. In delivering the blow, Junot had exposed himself and, Lanusse being the better swordsman, brought his sabre round in a back-hander that inflicted a terrible wound eight inches long right across Junot's stomach.
It fell to Roger, the following morning, to break to his master the news of the affair and that Junot was lying at death's door. Bonaparte's first words were,' My poor Junot! Wounded for me! But the idiot; why did he not fight with pistols? ' Then, seized by one of his terrible rages, he cried:
' Why am I cursed with such Generals? Have they not enough to do with the Mamelukes and the Arabs, that they must go into the reeds of the Nile and cut each other's throats among the crocodiles? For this Junot deserves putting under arrest for a month as soon as he gets well.'
Another General who was constantly whining to get home was Berthier. While in Rome, the ugly little man had fallen in love with the beautiful Madame Visconti. So consumed with passion for her was he that during the campaign his Staff-work had gone all to pieces, and Bourrienne had actually come upon him in his tent, kneeling on the ground and praying before a portrait of his lovely mistress.
Roger could sympathize with him, as his own craving for Zanthe continued unabated. The Provost Marshal's police had completely failed to trace ben-Jussif; but towards the end of August chance led to Roger's seeing her again.
Among Bonaparte's endeavours to render the garrison of Cairo more content had been the organizing of the Tivoli Garden. A number of cafes had been opened there, at which officers and men could drink, play cards and discuss the news that came in from the Divisions that were still carrying on a guerilla warfare in the desert. It was also frequented by the few Frenchwomen who had succeeded in smuggling themselves on to the ships of the armada, or had since managed to reach Egypt on other vessels, the wives and daughters of the European merchants established in Cairo and of those wealthy Copts who were not, like the Moslem ladies, confined to harems.
In the cool of the evenings, except that it was graced with palms instead of chestnut trees, it had become more or less a replica of the garden of the Palais Royal in Paris. Zanthe was half French, and Roger had a faint hope that one evening she might come to the garden; so he often frequented it; but it was not there that he was destined to meet her.
Other diversions instituted by Bonaparte were duck-shoots in the early morning in the marshes of the Nile, and boating parties on the river later in the day. One afternoon Roger, Duroc and Lavalette decided to go on a boating expedition, so went down to one of the wharves. Two handsome palanquins had been set down on it. They obviously belonged to someone of importance, for not only were there negro bearers lounging beside them but also an escort of Turkish Janissaries.
While Roger and his fellow aides-de-camp were waiting for a boat, a beautiful gilded barge pulled in to the wharf. Two more Janissaries sprang out of it and proceeded to help ashore half a dozen Muslim ladies. All of them were wrapped in voluminous robes of silk and wore yashmaks which concealed the lower parts of their faces. The first of the group was obviously elderly and, as she passed the French officers, she lowered her eyes to the ground; but the second gave them a quick glance and Roger caught it. He would have known those wonderful tawny eyes anywhere.
' Zanthe! ' he cried, springing forward.
The startled look in her eyes showed that she had already recognized him but, instantly, she switched her glance away and hurried after the leader of the group towards the more richly decorated of the two palanquins. At Roger's cry, the Janissaries gave him an angry stare and closed round the ladies. Duroc, meanwhile, had grabbed him by the arm, pulled him back and demanded:
' What are you about? '
' That lady . . .' Roger stammered. '1 know her! Let me go! I must speak with her.'
Stiil gripping his arm, Duroc exclaimed, ' You cannot! Are you mad? You know the General-in-Chief's orders. These people are Turks, and of high standing. They are our allies, and he'll have your head off if you interfere with one of their women.'
'She's not a Turk; she's French! Or half French, anyway,' Roger protested. But Duroc continued to cling to him, while the six women mounted into the palanquins and were borne away.
For a further few minutes Roger and Duroc wrangled, then, on Roger's giving his word that he would do nothing rash, Duroc let him go. Hurriedly he set off after his beloved until he came up to within a dozen paces of the rear palanquin, and he followed it at a slower pace. For a quarter of an hour the little cavalcade wound its way through the tortuous streets of the old city, then entered the courtyard of a large palace that Roger instantly recognized. It was that of the Sultan's Viceroy, who had fled, and it had since been occupied by the Pasha whom he had left behind as his deputy.