The Bagpipers

by George Sand

We were in no great hurry to finish our supper, for certainly the place was dry, and when the fire burned down to a bed of hot ashes, the weather had grown so warm and clear that we felt very comfortable and quite ready to listen to the lively talk and fine ideas of the muleteer. He was silent from time to time, listening to the river, which still roared a good deal; and as the mountain brooks were pouring into it with a thousand murmuring voices, there was no likelihood that we could set forth again that night. Huriel, after going down to examine it, advised us to go to sleep. He made a bed for Brulette with the mule-pads, wrapping her well up in all the extra garments he had with him, and talking gayly, but with no gallant speeches, showing her the same interest and tenderness, and no more, that he would have shown to a little child.

Then he stretched himself, without cushion or covering, on the bare ground which was well dried by the fire, invited me to do the same, and was soon as fast asleep as a dormouse—or nearly so.

I was lying quiet, though not asleep, for I did not like that kind of dormitory, when I heard a bell in the distance, as if the clairin had got loose and was straying in the forest. I lifted myself a little and saw him still where I had tied him. I knew therefore it was some other clairin, which gave notice of the approach or vicinity of other muleteers.

Huriel had instantly risen on his elbow, listening; then he got on his feet and came to me. "I am a sound sleeper," he said, "when I have only my mules to watch; but now that I have a precious princess in charge it is another matter, and I have only been asleep with one eye. Neither have you, Tiennet, and that's all right. Speak low and don't move; I don't want to meet my comrades; and as I chose this place for its solitude I think they won't find us out."

He had hardly said the words when a dark form glided through the trees and passed so close to Brulette that a little more and it would have knocked her. It was that of a muleteer, who at once gave a loud cry like a whistle, to which other cries responded from various directions, and in less than a minute half a dozen of these devils, each more hideous to behold than the others, were about us. We had been betrayed by Huriel's dog, who, nosing his friends and companions among the dogs of the muleteers, had gone to find them, and acted as guide to their masters in discovering our retreat.

Huriel tried to conceal his uneasiness; for though I softly told Brulette not to stir, and placed myself before her, it seemed impossible, surrounded as we were, to keep her long from their prying eyes.

I had a confused sense of danger, guessing at more than I really saw, for Huriel had not had time to explain the character of the men who were now with us. He spoke to the first-comer in the half-Auvergnat patois of the Upper Bourbonnais, which he seemed to speak quite as well as the other man, though he was born in the low-country. I could understand only a word here and there, but I made out that the talk was friendly, and that the other was asking him who I was and what he was doing here. I saw that Huriel was anxious to draw him away, and he even said to me, as if to be overheard by the rest, for they could all understand the French language, "Come, Tiennet, let us say good-night to these friends and start on our way."

But instead of leaving us alone to make our preparations for departure, the others, finding the place warm and dry, began to unpack their mules and turned them loose to feed until daybreak.

"I will give a wolf-cry to get them out of sight for a few minutes," whispered Huriel. "Don't move from here, and don't let her move till I return. Meantime saddle the mules so that we can start quickly; for to stay here is the worst thing we can do."

He did as he said, and the muleteers all ran to where the cry sounded. Unhappily I lost patience, and thought I could profit by the confusion to save Brulette. I thought I could make her rise without any one seeing her, for the wrappings made her look like a bale of clothes. She reminded me that Huriel had told us to wait for him; but I was so possessed with anger and fear and jealousy, even suspecting Huriel himself, that I fairly lost my head, and seeing a close copse very near us, I took my cousin firmly by the hand and began to run towards it.