“After what I have seen, sir, I doubt if you ever have need of me,” said Roland; “but in any case remember that you have a friend near the First Consul.”
And he held out his hand to Cadoudal. The royalist took it with the same frankness and freedom he had shown before the battle.
“Farewell, Monsieur de Montrevel,” said he, “I need not ask you to justify General Hatry. A defeat like that is fully as glorious as a victory.”
During this time Brise-Bleu’s horse had been led up for the Republican colonel.
He sprang into the saddle.
“By the bye,” said Cadoudal, “as you go through La Roche-Bernard, just inquire what has happened to citizen Thomas Millière.”
“He is dead,” said a voice.
Coeur-de-Roi and his four men, covered with mud and sweat, had just arrived, but too late for the battle.
Roland cast a last glance at the battlefield, sighed, and, waving a last farewell to Cadoudal, started at a gallop across the fields to await, on the road to Vannes, the wagon-load of wounded and the prisoners he was asked to deliver to General Hatry.
Cadoudal had given a crown of six sous to each man.