"Excuse me, I'll go first."
"No; I assure you, my boy, that the danger is equally great behind. I must be guide. I go first; we'll avoid the pathways, and I will lead you carefully to a point where you have only one thing to do: go straight ahead and cross a road, then a few yards of underwood, and beyond is French soil."
M. Ulrich embraced Jean silently and quickly; he did not wish to lose control of himself, when all depended on calmness.
"Come," he said.
They commenced the descent under cover of the tall fir-trees which commenced just there. The slope was strewn with obstacles, against which Jean or his uncle frequently stumbled, moss-covered stones, fallen and rotten trunks, broken branches, like claws stretched out in the darkness to bar the way. Every moment M. Ulrich stopped to listen and would frequently look round, to make sure that Jean's tall form was close behind him—it was too dark to see his face.
"They'll be checkmated, uncle," whispered Jean.
"Not too fast, my Jean; we are not yet safe."
Still under cover, the fugitives reached the meadows of the Minières, and began to ascend the mountain opposite, but without quitting cover.
When M. Ulrich reached the summit he stopped and sniffed the wind, which blew more freely through the young trees.
"Do you smell the air of France?" he murmured, in spite of the danger of talking.