At the close of the letter, Catherine Lefèvre was overwhelmed with emotion.
"What a brave boy!" said she. "He only knows his duty. There! thou hearest, Louise? He embraces thee!"
Louise then throwing herself into her arms, they embraced each other; and Catherine, notwithstanding the firmness of her character, could not keep back two large tears from trickling down her cheeks; then, recovering herself, "Come," said she, "all is well! Come, Brainstein, you must eat some meat and drink a glass of wine. And here is a crown-piece for your journey; I would give you the same sum every day of the week for such a letter."
The postman, delighted with his present, followed the old dame. Louise walked after them, and Jean-Claude, also, being eager to interrogate Brainstein as to what he had learnt on the road, touching the events taking place; but he could get nothing new out of him, except that the allies were besieging Bitsche and Lutzelstein, and that they had lost some hundreds of men in trying to force the Graufthal pass.
CHAPTER XX
THE SURPRISE
Toward ten o'clock, Catherine Lefèvre and Louise, after having wished Hullin good-night, went up to sleep in the room over the large kitchen; in which there were two feather-beds, with curtains, striped with blue and red, reaching to the ceiling.
"Come," exclaimed the old woman, climbing up to hers on a chair—"come, sleep well, my child. As for me, I am tired out, and almost asleep already."
She drew the bedclothes round her, and five minutes after was sound asleep. Louise soon followed her example.