A Girl of the Commune

by G. A. Henty

"Had they seen any Franc-tireurs?"

Hitherto the answer to the question had been, no; but the men from Champigny gave a different answer.

Yes, a corps had fought there; they did not know who they were. They were dressed in gray. Whoever they were they fought like tigers. It was they, they all agreed, who saved Champigny.

"The Prussians were advancing," one said, "and we could not have held out much longer. They were advancing by the road, and through the gardens; it was all over with us, when the men in gray came up."

"I was at the barricade," one said, "there were not twenty of us left there when a company arrived. If they had fought in a hundred battles they could not have done better. They had their colonel with them. A fine old militaire. He was killed by my side. The Prussians never got a foot further, for though we were hard pressed again and again we held our ground till the cowards, who had run, began to come back again. It was hot, mademoiselle. I can tell you it was a rain-storm of bullets, and their shell fell every moment among us, and it would have been all up with them if the batteries had not silenced their guns."

"I was in one of the houses," his comrade put in; "we were doing our best to prevent the Prussians coming up through the gardens behind, but there were but few of us, and they were some hundreds strong. If they had gone on they would have caught us all in a trap, and we were just going to warn the others to fall back when we saw the Franc-tireurs come running up. They were smart fellows as well as brave ones. They knocked loopholes through a wall in no time and clung to it for an hour, at least. Then the Prussians were reinforced heavily. The Franc-tireurs fell back to the next wall, and when the Prussians rushed forward, they gave it them hotly while we took them in flank from the houses; they must have a hundred and fifty men left behind them when they rushed back to the wall they had advanced from.

"And did the Franc-tireurs suffer much?" Mary asked.

"I should say they lost more than half their number. When they formed up after the fighting was over and the Prussians driven back, we gave them a hearty cheer. I believe there were three companies of them when they came up, and altogether there were not more than a strong company paraded. You must not think that all the others were killed, mad'moiselle," seeing by Mary's face that the news was terrible to her. "Of those who didn't parade you may reckon that two-thirds were only wounded."

"Not so many as that," the other, who had not observed Mary's face, said, "they were not the fellows to fall out for a slight wound. Why, the best part of those who paraded had hurts, and I fancy some of them were serious, though they did their best to make light of it, and waved their caps when we cheered them. You may be sure that those who were missing must have been hard hit indeed."

"Imbecile beast," his comrade growled, as Mary moved silently away, "could you not see by her face that the girl had friends in that corps? Didn't you notice how pleased she looked when we praised their bravery and how white her face came, when I said what their losses were. I tried to comfort her by making out that most of the missing might be only wounded, and then, imbecile that you are, you break in with your talk and as good as tell her that if they ain't all dead, they are likely to be so before long."