The rear-guard of the Grand Army fared worse and worse as the days and weeks passed, its numbers diminished until there remained but a straggling remnant which crept into Vilna, only to be chased out again within a few hours of their arrival there. Louise, in her captain's epaulettes, was still alive and well, though thin and haggard almost beyond recognition for want of good food and rest.
At Vilna she came across several officers of Henri d'Estreville's Lancer regiment, and these she questioned—in terror for their reply—in hopes of news of her friend, who was not with them.
"D'Estreville?" cried one of them, laughing grimly. "Where is he, you ask? I should say that depends, for those who believe in a future existence, upon his past life. Henri was the best of bons camarades, but it may be that good comradeship is a quality which is not highly valued by those who will make up our accounts!"
"Do you mean," poor Louise murmured, "that he has actually died; did you see him die, or was he merely wounded? If so, where has he remained?"
"My friend," said the other, "I did not see him struck down; I know nothing of him. In these days, one thanks God if one is alive at sundown and not buried by these accursed Russian snows, with a thrice-damned Cossack bullet to keep one company. There is no time for friendship and philanthropy and so on."
"He is my dearest friend," Louise murmured; "if only I knew where he had fallen, I would return."
"Mon ami, hell is behind us, in the shape of Platof and Chechakof and their most damnable Cossacks. You would find it even more impossible to go backward than forward. Your friend may be alive and well for aught I know. Can either of you give this gentleman any information?"
"Who is it he wants—one of ours?" asked a second officer who sat by the stove almost too exhausted to eat the mess of stewed horseflesh which had been set before him.
Louise mentioned Henri's name.
"I saw him alive in the forest of Gusinof," said the man; "that is where Platof ambushed us and we got finally separated. He may be a prisoner, or of course Platof's devils may have cut him to pieces; he would not be the only one that died in that accursed wood, not by two thousand! That was the most detestable night I ever spent. Go and look for him in the forest, my friend, if your affection will carry you to so great a length. Good Lord! It is a thing David would have refused to do for Jonathan!" The weary man laughed and filled his mouth with the savoury horseflesh.