"He was hit at the barricade," said the croaking voice of Grain d'Orge in La Vireville's ear as he stooped over the prostrate man.
"Then why the devil didn't he say so!" retorted his leader. "Give me a hand, someone, and let us find out what is the matter with him. Ah, I see; fortunately nothing very serious."
And having duly played the part of surgeon—a part to which he was not unaccustomed—set another man at the fallen sentry's post, and made some further dispositions, La Vireville stood a moment looking through the tree-trunks towards Carnac, a little south of the dying sunset, wondering what was happening in the peninsula of Quiberon.
"And what shall we do next, Monsieur Augustin?" asked a voice rather timidly, the voice of Le Goffic.
La Vireville turned round. "I suppose, my children," he said, more kindly, "that unless M. d'Allègre holds Locmaria we shall have to go back to Carnac and tell the general that we have not been able to do what we were told to do. For the present, we will wait here till morning."
"If Monsieur Augustin would sleep a little . . .?" One or two of them had spread an old cloak under a tree, and now with gestures invited him to repose. They were like children; it was impossible to be long angry with them. So he went and lay down on the cloak, to find that in spite of disgust and anxiety he was ready to sleep. His new sentinel by the hedge, his musket leaning against him, was telling his beads, and all his men, directly he lay down, lowered their voices. He was drowsy, and floated away on a half-dream to Jersey. . . . Why on earth were they talking of Anne-Hilarion?
"The little one, thou seest, when he was with us at Kerdronan, how he was like the little Jesus Himself!"
"Yes, one looked to see His Mother round every corner."
"And as for him," said the first speaker, indicating his recumbent leader, "he might have been St. Joseph!" But at this comparison La Vireville was shaken with irreverent mirth.
He began to be more drowsy. Grain d'Orge was saying something about Carhoët—he could not catch what. But the mention of the name brought back the swarm of little memories that clung round it, that had had their birth in so small a space of hours. His foot was healed, the business of leader of that division passed on, at his request, to someone else, but he had not forgotten Mme. de Guéfontaine. On the contrary, he had found himself often thinking of her during the few weeks that had elapsed since she had made her somewhat sensational entry into his experience. He was aware now of the sleepy conviction that she ought to have had some part in this adventure—not indeed in the present sorry episode of defeat, but in the landing the other night under the moon. Or she might have stood, at daybreak, holding aloft the banner with the lilies on the prow of one of those incoming boats. . . . She would, surely, have been in her element. . . .