“Nothing,” he answered gravely; “but if you have any strength at all, you should join the march. It is your only chance, Mademoiselle.”
She shook her delicate head. “Please permit me to stay with you. We might help each other. This is very terrible—the wolves are the worst.” She set her lips, and her pinched face had a look of decided strength. “Will the army be passing all night?” she added.
“I do not think so—surely there cannot be many more.”
“I was thinking when they go—perhaps the wolves——” She paused.
He was unused to these severe latitudes; there were wolves in France, but they had never troubled him.
“They might attack us,” she finished, seeing he did not comprehend.
He took his pistols from his belt and laid them on the ground beside him.
“I am armed,” he answered.
The Countess rose stiffly; her thick fur-lined cloak fell apart and showed the bright colours of her dress beneath, the tags and braids of gold, the vermilion sash and ruffled laces. “It is strange that I should live and my brother die, is it not?” she said wearily. “He fell from his horse and struck his head on a broken gun. Then he died very quickly.” There was dried blood on her fur gloves and on the bosom of her shirt. She went to the unconscious child and knelt beside her, moved the wrappings from the pallid, dead-coloured face, and touched the cheek. “I think she will never wake again—but your friend?” She glanced at the Marquis, who was standing looking down at M. d’Espagnac.
“I can only watch him die,” he said.