“You mean—”
“I mean, my child, that here is a brave heart, and wherever a brave heart beats there is the love of old Jules Picard.”
He bent and kissed her hand. His bantering mood had passed. From the valley below there came the dull echoing roar of artillery. An aide-de-camp, with mud even upon his face, went by at a gallop, and disappeared in the hither wood. Some Turcos came down the hill at a double, crying to each other that the Prussians were crossing the river. In the wood at the bend of the road they could distinguish between the trees the red trousers and blue coats of infantrymen. A bivouac had been broken up there. Fires still smoked, but the cooking-pots were overturned, and the grass trampled in the haste of assembly. A pair of horses drawing a battery caisson overpowered their driver and dashed blindly down the hill to the Strasburg road. The thunder of their hoofs was to be heard for a long time. Then silence fell again upon the thickets.
Old Jules Picard was gaily dressed that morning. A coat of dark blue carried the button of an order; his vest was in the old style, with embroidery upon it. He wore smart gaiters and white breeches; a diamond circlet sparkled about his cravat. The excitement that he suffered betrayed itself in gesture alone. He talked incessantly, that the others might share his confidence. And Beatrix, in her turn, listened to him wonderingly. This, then, was the day of battle! The unchanging forest seemed to mock the thought. The distant roar of the awakening artillery was as an echo of ill speaking beyond the river.
They took their coffee in the arbour of the roses. Looking down thence over the woods and the vineyards they could see the river at Gunstett, the mill in the marsh, the distant heights whereon the Prussians lurked, the white villages and the fields of maize. Everywhere the eye could find a panorama of wood and hill land. Such troops as were to be perceived appeared neither hasting nor active. A few puffs of smoke hung above the opposing heights. The horses of cavalry, even the sturdy figures of cuirassiers passed in and out between the trees. But there was no panoply of war—no charge and countercharge. The interval of waiting had come; the hush before the storm.
“Monsieur is là-bas, in the wood,” said old Picard, as Beatrix, with trembling hand, filled him a cup of coffee; “we shall see him presently, and he will take déjeuner with us. I do not account this a day of any importance. You were wise to remain, Madame—wise and brave.”
She smiled at his compliment.
“I am brave because there is no danger. You think that there is none, then, Monsieur Picard?”
There was a note of anxiety in the question which she could not hide from him. No moment spared her. A voice said always that Edmond might never return to the châlet.
Old Picard observed it and turned to banter again.