[CHAPTER IV]
A wolf-hunt—Small towns—Choron's tragic death.
Five or six years had flown by since the events we have just related. I had left Villers-Cotterets, and I had returned there to spend a few days with my good mother.
It was in the month of December, and the ground was completely covered with snow.
My mother kissed me over and over again. Then, I ran straight off to M. Deviolaine's.
"Ah! there you are, boy," he said; "you have come in the nick of time!"
"A wolf-hunt, isn't it?"
"Exactly so."
"I thought there would be as I looked at the snow, and I am delighted I was not wrong in thinking so."