"Now, what are you going to do?"
"We were going to report ourselves, colonel."
"No use going today--too late. Come and dine with me, at the Bordeaux. Have you got rooms?"
"Not yet, colonel."
"Then I can tell you you won't get them, at all. The place is crowded--not a bed to be had, for love or money. I've got rooms, by the greatest good luck. One of you can have the sofa; the other an armchair, or the hearth rug, whichever suits you best."
"Thank you, very much; we shall do capitally," the boys said.
"And now, have you any news from Paris?"
"We have no late news from Paris but, worse still, the news gets very slowly and irregularly into Paris. The pigeons seem to get bewildered with the snow, or else the Prussians shoot them."
"But surely, with such an immense circle to guard, there could be no great difficulty in a messenger finding his way in?"
"There is a difficulty, and a very great one," Colonel Tempe said; "for of all who have tried, only one or two have succeeded. Now come along, or we shall be late for dinner."