* * * * * *
Just one more little incident of the road, to close the record of our excursion. It would not be worth mentioning, had not the future given it significance.
It was towards evening; the sun had gone down behind one set of heavy clouds, and the wind was whipping up another set to join them. We were anxious to get on, and if possible to find a short cut to our destination, so we consulted a man who was mending the road. He had evidently not been talked to for some time, and wanted to make the most of his chance, for instead of a simple answer, he gave us a long yarn about his father's road and his brother's road, and about how his was so smooth we could play at billiards on it, but we couldn't on theirs. When we replied that we didn't want to play, but to walk it, he said we were only chaffing him. "I know you well," he added; "you are the two young men who are staying with Monsieur le Docteur."
We should have done better not to take our cue from this specimen of a billiard-table road-maker, for he misdirected us, and we must have got on to the father's road when we should have been on the brother's, or vice versâ. And the rain came on and drenched us, and soon there was a good deal of big cloud-rolling above us, and enough of light-flashing to show us there was nothing worth seeing—no house, no shelter of any kind. But we didn't mind; we knew that in an orthodox thunderstorm a friendly beacon of light shining from the window of a cottage is sure, sooner or later, to come to the rescue of the belated traveller; and so we pushed on till we discerned its twinkle. Then we made for it.
We were soon being hospitably received by the three inmates of the friendly cottage—an old man, an old woman, and a dog in the prime of life. The old man made up the fire on the brick hearth for us to dry our clothes by, the woman stirred something that was simmering in the caldron, and the dog sat down and stared at Dupont. He was a beautiful shaggy creature, a sort of shepherd-dog, I think; they called him Rollo. His pedigree might perhaps not have passed muster, but for all that, one felt sure that his sire and his sire's spouse must have been good dogs. I have never forgotten the deep mysterious look in that creature's eyes.
There were some pigs, too, somewhere in immediate proximity to us, but more heard than seen, consigned as they were to a dark corner, where they lustily grunted, whilst some of their relatives, already dismembered, hung up inside the chimney-breast, to be gradually smoked and cured. The old woman fetched a saucepan, and put something in it that bubbled and fizzed, and presently one could see floating, quivering particles come together and solidify, and finally emerge in pancake form. Good solid pancakes they were, like counterpanes, not like those flimsy kid-glove sort of pancakes we get in society. We fully enjoyed them, and the coarse peasant's bread and the home-made cider.
Then we went to bed—to palliasse rather, for two big bags filled with straw were laid down for us, and we turned in, or rather on. Our hosts had made us as comfortable as they could, and we felt that all we could do in return was to sleep well and to forget a few francs on the table when we left. The old man was so kind; he knew from the first that we were itinerant painters, and that no discredit attached to our calling. "C'est un métier comme un autre de faire des images,"[3] he said encouragingly. They were a cheerful couple, those two old people, and looked as if they had not known much trouble or worry, and had just collected their wrinkles, as time went on, for what they were worth.
One does sleep soundly on a bag of straw after a thunderstorm and a rustic supper, and I should have done so till sunrise if, some time in the middle of the night, Rollo had not poked his nose into my face. I woke up with a start, and looking round, was surprised to see Dupont standing at the window, gazing into space.
"What's the matter?" I said.
"Nothing," he answered. "It's a wonderful night."