"To Paris—I suppose so," I said vaguely.
"This horse belongs to Hugues," she said, stroking the animal's neck. "I may find means to send it back to him.—Well, adieu! God be with you on your journey, Monsieur,—and through your life."
"Oh, Madame!—adieu, if you will have it so! adieu!—adieu, Louis!"
She smiled acquiescently at my use of the name by which I had had occasion to call her a few times at our lodging-places. Then, saying once more, "Adieu, Henri!" she turned her horse's head and started down the by-road. With a heavy heart, I waited till she had disappeared in the woods. I had hoped she might look back, but she had not done so.
A movement of my rein, which I made without intention, was taken by my horse as a signal to go on, and the creature, resuming its original direction, kept to the highway and plodded along toward Bonneval and Paris.
Never in all my life, before or since, have I felt so alone. What was there for me to do now? All my care, all my heart, was with the solitary figure on horseback somewhere yonder in the forest. Had life any object for me elsewhere?
Yes, faith!—and I laughed ironically as it came back to my thoughts—I might now go on to Paris and cut off the moustaches of Brignan de Brignan!