"Sander wires that he has run Miste to earth in Nice. Wait for me. I follow by day mail."
The message was from Alphonse Giraud.
I laboured all day in Madame's interests, and re-engaged some of the servants who had been scattered by the war and Commune, and a fear, perhaps, of acknowledging any sympathy for the nobility.
In the evening I met Alphonse Giraud on his arrival at the Gare du Nord, and found him in fine feather, carrying a stick of British oak, which he had bought, he told me, for Miste's back.
"It will not be a matter of hitting each other with walking sticks," I answered.
We drove across to the Lyons station, and took the night mail to Marseilles. It was my second night out of bed. But I was hardy in those days, and can still thank God that I am stronger than many of my contemporaries.
"Confound you!" cried Alphonse to me the next morning as the train raced down the valley of the Loire. "You have slept all night!"
"Of course."
"And I not a wink—when each moment brings us nearer to Miste. You are no sportsman after all, Dick."
"He is the best sportsman who has the coolest head," replied I, sleepily.