We assumed a breezy deportment, under the raking scrutiny of five or six patriot savages—mere arrogant péagers, down whose dirty faces the rain trickled sluggishly like oil. Foul straw was stuft into their clogs; over their shoulders, nipped with a skewer at the neck, were flung frowzy squares of sacking, in the hanging corners of which they held the flint-locks of their pieces for dryness’ sake. By the door of the village taxing-house, that stood hard by the barrier, a ferret-faced postilion—the only man of them all in boots—lounged, replaiting the lash of his whip and drawing the string through his mouth.
“Graceless weather, citizens!” said I.
A squinting bonnet-rouge damned me for un âne ennuyant.
“Keep thy breath,” said he, “for what is less obvious;” and he surlily demanded the production of our papers.
“A good patriot,” growled another, “walks with his face to Paris.”
“So many of them have their heads turned, it is true,” whispered Carinne.
The squinting man wedged his eyes upon her.
“What is that?” he said sharply—“some mot de ralliement? Be careful, my friends! I have the gift to look straight into the hearts of traitors!”
It was patent, however, that he deceived himself. He snatched the papers rudely from me, and conned them all at cross-purposes.
“Sacré corps!” he snapped—“what is thy accursed name?”