About ten o'clock in the evening, Catherine Lefévre and Louise, having
wished Hullin good-night, went up into the room overhead. There were
two large feather beds; and the tall bedsteads, nearly as high as
the ceiling, with their long curtains, striped blue and red, had an
extremely warm and comfortable appearance.
"Come," exclaimed the old farm-mistress, getting upon her chair, "come,
sleep well, my child; for my part, I am quite worn out; I can keep up
no longer."
She drew the bed-clothes over her, and in less than five minutes after
she was sound asleep.
Louise, being also exhausted, was not long in following her example.
Now this had lasted about a couple of hours, when the old woman was
awakened with a start by a fearful tumult. Everything was in an uproar.
"To arms!" was the cry--"to arms! Hi! this way, a thousand thunders!
they are upon us!"
Five or six shots followed, illuminating the dark window-panes.
"To arms! to arms!"
The shots were heard again. People were hurrying to and fro. Then
Hullin's voice was heard--sharp, penetrating, issuing orders. Then to
the left of the farm, a good distance off, came a sound like a heavy
prolonged crackling in the gorges of the Grosmann.
"Louise, Louise!" exclaimed Catherine, "did you hear that noise?"
"Yes. Oh! heavens! how terrible!"
Catherine jumped out of bed.
"Get up, my child," said she; "let us dress ourselves."
The shots were by this time redoubled, and kept passing like flashes of
lightning across the window-panes.
"Attention!" shouted Materne.
With these sounds were mingled the neighing of a horse outside, and the
trampling of a multitude of people in the alley, in the court-yard, and
in front of the farm; the house seemed shaken to its very foundations.
All at once the firing was replied to from the windows of the room on
the ground floor. The two women dressed themselves in haste. At this
moment the staircase creaked under a heavy footstep; the door opened,
and Hullin appeared with a lantern, pale, his hair in disorder, and
every sign of agitation visible in his face.
"Make haste!" he exclaimed; "we have not a moment to lose."
"Why, what is happening?" asked Catherine anxiously.
The firing was evidently coming nearer and nearer.
"What?" exclaimed Jean-Claude, almost beside himself, and wildly
tossing up his arms; "do you think I have time to explain things to
you?"
The farm-mistress saw that there was nothing to do but obey orders.
She took her hood, and descended the staircase with Louise. By the
flickering light of the shots, Catherine saw Materne, bare-necked,
and his son, Kasper, firing from the entrance of the valley on to the
barricades, while ten others behind them kept loading and handing
the guns to them, so that they had nothing to do but to take aim and
fire. All this motley group, busily engaged in loading, shouldering,
and firing, gave a terrible aspect to the scene. Three or four dead
bodies, propped up against the old decayed wall, added to the horror of
the combat; the smoke was beginning to make its way rapidly into the
dwelling.
When they had reached the foot of the staircase, Hullin exclaimed:
"Here they are, thanks be to God!" And all the brave fellows about
there, looking up and seeing them, called out, "Courage! Mother
Lefévre!"
Then the poor old dame, her frame quite shattered by so many emotions,
began to cry. She leaned on the shoulder of Jean-Claude; but the latter
passed his strong arm round her, and carried her off like a feather,
running all along the wall to the right. Louise followed, crying and
sobbing.
Out of doors nothing was to be heard but the whizzing of bullets
through the air, heavy thuds against the wall; bricks and mortar were
giving way, and tiles flying about in all directions, and exactly
opposite, in the vicinity of the barricades, three hundred paces off,
were to be seen the white uniforms, in line, lit up by their own fire
in the thick darkness of night, and then to their left, on the other
side of the ravine of the Minières, the mountaineers, who were taking
them in the flank.
Hullin disappeared at the turning by the farm; there all was plunged in
darkness. It was as much as you could do to catch a glimpse of Doctor
Lorquin on horseback in front of a sleigh, a long cavalry sword in
his hand, two holster-pistols in his belt, and Frantz Materne, with a
dozen of men, with grounded arms, trembling with rage. Hullin placed
Catherine in the sledge, on a truss of straw, and then Louise beside
her.
"There you are!" exclaimed the doctor, "and it's a very lucky thing!"
And Frantz Materne added: "If it had not been for you, Dame Lefévre,
you may easily believe that not one of us would quit this spot
to-night; but when you are in the case, there is nothing to say."
"No," cried the others; "there is nothing to say."
At the same moment, a great tall, long-backed fellow, with legs as long
as a heron's, came from behind the wall, running at full speed, and
shouting: "The enemy! Fly! save yourselves!"
Hullin turned as pale as death.
"It is the great grinder of the Harberg," said he, gnashing his teeth.
Frantz said not a word; he shouldered his carbine, took aim, and fired.
Louise saw the grinder, thirty paces off in the shadow, stretch out his
two long arms, and fall, face downwards, to the ground.
Frantz re-loaded his gun, smiling with a strange expression.
Hullin said: "Comrades, here is our mother; she who has given us
powder, and supplied us with food for the defence of our country, and
here is my child save them!"
They all replied, with one voice: "We will save them, or perish with
them."
"And do not forget to tell Divès that he is to remain at the
Falkenstein till further orders."
"All right, Master Jean-Claude."
"Then forward, doctor, forward!" cried the brave man.
"And you, Hullin?" said Catherine.
"For me, my place is here; we shall have to defend our position to the
death!"
"Papa Jean-Claude!" cried Louise, stretching out her arms to him.
But he had already turned the corner; the doctor struck his horse, the
sleigh sped over the snow, and behind followed Frantz Materne and his
men, carbine on shoulder, while the firing still continued all round
the farm. This is what Catherine Lefévre and Louise beheld in the space
of a few minutes. Something strange and terrible had doubtless happened
during the night. The old farm-mistress, recollecting her dream, grew
silent and absorbed. Louise dried her tears, and threw a long look on
the hillside she was leaving, and which was all alight, as if on fire.
The horse, urged by the doctor, went at full speed; the mountaineers
who formed the escort could hardly keep up with him. For a long time
still the tumult, the sounds of the combat, the explosions, the hissing
of bullets whistling through the trees, continued to be heard; but
all this, by degrees, grew less and less, and in a short time, at the
descent of the path, all had disappeared as in a dream.
The sledge had just reached the other acclivity of the mountain,
and was speeding like an arrow through the darkness of the night.
The gallop of the horse, the hurried breathing of the escort, the
occasional cry of the doctor, "Up, Bruno! come up, then!" alone
disturbed the silence.
A strong gust of cold air coming up from the valleys of the Sarre,
brought from a distance, like a sigh, the ceaseless sounds of the
torrents and the woods. The moon, just emerging from behind the cloud,
shed her pale light over the gloomy forests of the Blanru with their
tall fir-trees loaded with snow.
Ten minutes after, the sledge reached the corner of these woods, and
Doctor Lorquin, turning round on his saddle, called out:
"Now, Frantz, what shall we do? This is the path which leads towards
the hills of St. Quirin, and this other leads down to the Blanru; which
shall we take?"
Frantz and his escort had come up with them. As they found themselves
then on the eastern declivity of the Donon, they began to see again, on
the other side, high in air, the firing of the Germans who came by the
Grosmann.
They saw nothing but the flashes, and a few instants after the reports
awoke the echoes of the abyss.
"The path by the hills of St. Quirin," said Frantz, "is the
shortest way to the farm of Bois-des-Chênes; we shall gain at least
three-quarters of an hour."
"Yes," cried the doctor; "but we risk being stopped by the
_kaiserlicks_, who now hold the pass of the Sarre. See, they are
already masters of the heights; they have, no doubt, sent detachments
on to Sarre-Rouge to secure the passage of the Donon."
"Let us take the path by the Blanru," said Frantz; "it is longer, but
it is safer."
The sleigh descended the path, to the left through the woods. The
volunteers marched one behind the other, gun in hand, on the rising
ground, while the doctor on horseback in the road beneath made his way
through the untrodden snow that lay thick upon the ground. Above hung
the branches of the dark fir-trees overshadowing the gloomy pathway,
while all around the moon was shining brightly. As they proceeded thus
for about a quarter of an hour, in silence, Catherine, after having
held her tongue for a long while, not being able to contain herself any
longer, exclaimed:
"Doctor Lorquin, now that you have got us into the pass of the Blanru,
and can do what you like with us, perhaps you will be good enough to
explain why we have been taken away by force? Jean-Claude came and
caught me up in his arms, and tossed me on to this truss of straw, and
here I am!"
"Houp, Bruno!" said the doctor.
Then he gravely replied:--"To-night, Dame Catherine, the worst of
misfortunes has befallen us. You must not be angry with Jean-Claude,
for through the fault of another, we lose the fruit of all our
sacrifices."
"By whose fault?"
"Of that unlucky Labarbe, who has not held the pass of the Blutfeld. He
has since died doing his duty; but that does not repair the disaster,
and if Piorette does not come in time to the support of Hullin, all is
lost! We must yield our posts, and beat a retreat."
"What! Blutfeld is taken?"
"Yes, Dame Catherine; who the deuce would have ever thought that the
Germans could approach that way? A defile almost impracticable for foot
passengers, hemmed in as it is between perpendicular rocks, where the
shepherds themselves can hardly descend with their flocks of goats.
Well, they passed through there, two by two; surprised Roche-Creuse;
they killed Labarbe, and then fell upon Jerôme, who defended himself
like a lion until nine o'clock in the evening; but, at the last, he was
obliged to fly into the fir forest, and leave the passage free to the
_kaiserlicks_. That is the whole of the story. It is fearful. There
must have been in the country some man cowardly enough, vile enough, to
guide the enemy to our rear, and deliver us up, bound hand and foot.
Oh! the wretch!" exclaimed Lorquin, his voice quivering with rage. "I
am not naturally cruel; but if he should fall into my clutches, I would
tear him to pieces! Houp, Bruno! come up!"
The volunteers still continued their way along the rising ground,
silently, like shadows.
The sleigh again set off at full gallop, then, after a while, relaxed
its speed; the horse was panting for breath.
The old farm-mistress continued silent, to arrange these fresh ideas in
her head.
"I begin to understand," said she, after a few moments; "we have been
attacked to-night in front and on the side."
"Exactly so, Catherine; fortunately, ten minutes before the attack,
one of Marc Divès' men--a smuggler, Zimmer, the ex-dragoon--came in
breathless haste to put us on our guard. But for that, we should have
been lost. He came up with our vanguard, after having ran the gauntlet
of a whole regiment of Cossacks on the side of the Grosmann. The poor
devil had received a terrible sword-thrust; his bowels were hanging
over his saddle; were they not, Frantz?"
"Yes," gloomily replied the young huntsman.
"And what did he say?" asked the old farm-mistress.
"He had only time to cry, 'To arms! we are surprised. Jerôme has sent
me. Labarbe is dead. The Germans have forced the Blutfeld.'"
"He was a brave man," said Catherine.
"Yes, he was a brave man!" replied Frantz, despondingly.
Then all became silent again, and for a long time the sleigh continued
to wend its way along the winding valley.
At times it was obliged to stop, the snow was so deep; three or four
mountaineers then got down to lead the horse by the bridle, and they
thus continued on their way.
"But, for all that," rejoined Catherine, suddenly rousing herself from
her reverie, "Hullin might just as well have told me."
"But if he had told you of those two attacks," interrupted the doctor,
"you would have wanted to stay behind."
"And who could have prevented my doing what I wish? If I pleased now to
alight at this moment from the sleigh and go back, should I not be free
to do so I have forgiven Jean-Claude, and I am sorry that I did so."
"Oh! Mother Lefévre, if he should happen to be killed while you were
saying that?" murmured Louise.
"The child is right," thought Catherine; and then quickly added: "I say
that I am sorry for it; but he is such a brave and worthy man that you
cannot be angry with him. I forgive him with all my heart; in his place
I should have acted like him."
Two or three hundred paces further on, they entered the defile of the
Roches. The snow had ceased to fall; the moon was shining brightly
between two large black and white clouds. The narrow gorge, shut in by
steep rocks, lay stretched in the distance, and on the mountain sides,
tall fir-trees lifted their lofty tops to the skies. Nothing disturbed
the deep silence of the woods; you might have thought yourself far away
from any human agitation. The silence was so profound that not only was
every one of the horse's steps distinctly heard on the snow, but at
times even his heavy breathing. Frantz Materne would sometimes stop,
and cast a hasty, anxious glance around, then step out quickly again to
overtake the others.
And valleys succeeded to valleys. The sleigh ascended, descended,
turned to the right, then to the left, while the mountaineers, with the
glitter of their steel bayonets just visible in the greyish dawn, as
perseveringly followed it.
They had just reached thus, about four o'clock in the morning, the
meadow of the Brimbelles, where there may be seen in our own day a
large oak just at the turn of the valley. On the other side, on the
left, in the midst of trees and shrubs all white with snow, behind its
little stone wall, and the palings of its little garden, the old house
of the keeper Cuny was just beginning to be visible, with its three
beehives safely fixed on a plank, its old knotty vine creeping to the
very top of its shelving roof, and its little branch of fir suspended
outside in form of a sign, for Cuny carried on also the trade of
publican in this solitary place.
[Illustration]