"I thought I heard...."
"Well?"
"Firing!"
I listened attentively. No, there was nothing. I chaffed him on his hallucinations! Was he profiting by Ravelli's teaching? Firing indeed! An excellent joke! We had left the enemy more than a hundred and thirty miles behind.
Guillaumin did not persist. The time which had been fixed passed by. Then we were told that we should be there for another two hours.
I left the railway lines and went off into the open fields.
I noticed that our convoy was not the only one which had been stopped there. The black line stretched away as far as eye could see, bordered with a swarm of uniforms, and smoking bonfires. The line was badly blocked.
As I had plenty of time before me, the idea occurred to me of climbing the nearest hill. I followed a chalky path.
I had imagined that this crest was quite near by, and that I should reach it without any difficulty. I only breasted it after twenty minutes of breathless climbing.