"Ah ca, j'etouffe!" said a deep, gruff voice, in the midst of the
hubbub.
As neither the postilion nor myself were hurt, we were quickly on our
legs: he trying to get the horses disentangled--for they were kicking
each other to pieces--and I to aid a thin, meek-looking peasant lad, who
had been driving the shandrydan, to right the crazy vehicle.
'Twas a square, black-looking thing, covered at top, with no opening
whatever but a small window in the door behind. It might have been built
some time in the reign of Louis le Bien-aime, and its cracked leather
sides and harness seemed as if they had been strangers to oil ever
since. If people were not very corpulent, four might have squeezed into
it--not that they would have been comfortable, but they could have got
in, and would have sat on the opposite seats, without much room to
spare.
Some honest old Frenchman, thought I to myself, with his wife and
daughter, and perhaps their maid. Poor man! he is coming from the Baths,
cured of some painful malady, and now has had the misfortune to run the
risk of his life--if, indeed, his bones be not broken--and all through
that etourdi of a postilion. "If I do not report him to the maitre de
poste!" said I to myself.
"For the love of God, messieurs," said a faint voice, "get us out!"
"The door! the door! open the door then!" said at least three other
voices, one after the other and all together.
"Je meurs!" wept the bass-voice from the inmost recesses of the
vehicle--or it might have been from under ground, so deep and sepulchral
was its tone.
"Don't disturb yourself, monsieur," grumbled the postilion, who had now
got one of his horses on its legs; "'tis nothing! Come along, you
varmint!" said he to the poor young peasant, who stood wringing his
hands and looking distractedly at his whip--'twas broken clean in
half--"Arrive, te dis-je!--pousse bien la!--la bien! encore! hardi!
houp!"
The door of the shandrydan burst open, and there emerged, in sadly
rumpled state, a pitiable confusion of rustled petticoats and tumbled
headgear, red as the roses on a summer's morn, and dewy as the grass on
an autumn eve--_six soeurs-de-charite_, all white and black like
sea-fowl thrown from the shooter's bag--and after them, slowly toiling
forth and writhing through the door in unwieldy porpoise-guise--M. le
Cure!