"Do you hear?" said Geiger-Hans. "And do you know what that means?"
"They are fighting on the other side of the hill," said Steven, spurring towards the crest.
"Yes, it is perhaps worth your youthship's attention. Do not, however, flatter yourself that you are viewing a battle. A mere skirmish, un combat, nothing more; one of the hundred or so that takes place now, week in, week out, on the marches of the mighty conqueror's lands. For a small kingdom, little brother Jerome can flatter himself to have gathered to it, from without and within, a considerable collection of enemies—Cossacks hanging like jackals on the flanks of the great army; Prussians from the north, Saxons from the east, peasants and students from his own villages and cities. This raid is scarce like to appear in the Gazette, but it is enough, for the combatants! The dead yonder are as dead as though they had fallen at Austerlitz or the Moskowa. Hark, at the snap of the musket—that is the sound of the Empire cracking! 'Tis the Empire cracking," repeated the musician, running alongside, his hand at the stirrup-leather. "And the little House of Westphalia is doomed to fall, as the cottage falls on the hillside from the earthquake that has wrecked the city.... A back-wave from Moscow have we here to-day."
They had halted on the crest, and their gaze plunged into the open valley. A canopy of blue smoke hung over the fields that spread between their knoll and a little town, some half-mile distant. The mist was pierced with slow-moving lines of bayonets which flashed back the sunshine; it was traversed with colour.
Geiger-Hans ran a knowing eye over the scene:
"Aha! What did I tell you? Those are Prussians, holding the townlet," said he. "Contrast their sober uniform with Jerome's scarlets and greens, his plumes and gold lace. There go our runaways! See them draw up behind yonder crimson platoon—Brother Jerome's Grenadiers of the Guard, for he must ape big brother Napoleon.... Look, our friends the Cossacks roll back together like a swarm of hornets at the foot of the hill; they find themselves cut off from their Prussian allies—and if the Hussars but rally in time, we may see the rôles of the drama reversed in a minute."
He fell abruptly silent: something had flown between his head and Steven's as the latter bent towards him from his saddle—something that droned a strange song as it passed and puffed a cold breath on their cheeks.
"What was that?" asked Steven, starting.
"That was a stray Death," said the musician, placidly. "What say you—shall we seek cover?"
"Let us see the thing out!" cried Steven.