As they crossed the dining-room he gave vent to his astonishment: 'What, haven't you gone to bed?'
She shook her head; and then, in an undertone, she said: 'I cannot sleep. I have been sitting in an armchair near the colonel. He's in a burning fever, and wakes up every moment and questions me. I don't know what to answer him. Come in and see him.'
M. de Vineuil had already fallen asleep again. His long, red face—which his moustaches streaked with wavy snow—could scarcely be distinguished on the pillow, for Madame Delaherche had placed a newspaper before the lamp, so that the head of the bed was obscured. The bright light fell upon herself as she sat rigidly in the armchair, with her hands inertly resting in her lap, and her eyes gazing afar, in a tragic reverie.
'Wait a moment,' she murmured. 'I think he heard you come in. Yes, he is waking again.'
The colonel was, indeed, opening his eyes and fixing them on Delaherche without moving his head. He recognised the manufacturer, and in a voice which trembled with fever, he inquired: 'It's all over, isn't it? They are capitulating?'
Espying a glance which his mother gave him, Delaherche was on the point of telling an untruth. But what would be the good of it? And so, with a gesture of discouragement, he replied: 'What would you have them do? If you could only see the streets of the town. General de Wimpffen has just started for the German headquarters to discuss the conditions.'
M. de Vineuil's eyes had closed again, and a long shudder convulsed him, whilst from his lips escaped a hollow lamentation: 'Ah! my God! my God!' And without opening his eyes he continued in a spasmodical voice: 'Ah! it was yesterday that what I wanted ought to have been done. Yes, I know the district. I told the general what I feared; but they wouldn't even listen to him—all the heights up there, up above St. Menges, as far as Fleigneux, occupied by our men—the army commanding Sedan, and holding the defile of St. Albert. We wait there, our positions are impregnable, the road to Mézières remains open——'
Then his speech became embarrassed, and he could only stammer a few unintelligible words, whilst the fever-born vision of the battle slowly faded away, carried off by sleep. He slumbered, possibly still dreaming of victory.
'Does the major answer for him?' Delaherche asked, in a low voice. The old lady nodded affirmatively. 'All the same those wounds in the foot are terrible,' he resumed. 'He will be laid up for a long while, I suppose?'
This time she made no reply; she herself was absorbed in the great grief of the defeat. She belonged to another age, to those old, rough frontier-burgesses of bygone times, so ardent in defending their cities. The bright lamp-light fell upon her stern face, which with its sharp nose and thin lips bespoke all her anger and suffering, all the feeling of revolt that prevented her from sleeping.