"No, Monsieur."
"What!" I said. "Have none of the party come?" For I had gone to sleep expecting to be called up to receive them within the hour.
"No, M. le Vicomte," the old man answered, "except--except one gentleman who was with them, and who is now walking with M. le Curé in the garden. And for him----"
"Well?" I said sharply, for André, who had got on his most gloomy and dogmatic air, stopped with a sniff of contempt.
"He does not seem to be a man for whom M. le Vicomte should be roused," he answered obstinately. "But M. le Curé would have it; and in these days, I suppose, we must tramp for a smith, let alone an officer of excise."
"Buton is here, then?"
"Yes, Monsieur; and walking on the terrace, as if of the family. I do not know what things are coming to," André continued, grumbling, and raising his voice as I started to go out, "or what they would be at. But when M. le Vicomte took away the carcan I knew what was likely to happen. Oh! yes," he went on still more loudly, while he stood holding the tray, and looking after me with a sour face, "I knew what would happen! I knew what would happen!"
And, certainly, if I had not been shaken completely out of the common rut of thought, I should have found something odd, myself, in the combination of the three men whom I found on the terrace. They were walking up and down, Father Benôit, with downcast eyes and his hands behind him, in the middle. On one side of him moved Buton, coarse, heavy-shouldered, and clumsy, in his stained blouse; on the other side paced the stranger of last night, a neat, middle-sized man, very plainly dressed, with riding boots and a sword. Remembering that he had formed one of Louis' party, I was surprised to see that he wore the tricolour; but I forgot this in my anxiety to know what had become of the others. Without standing on ceremony, I asked him.
"They attacked the rioters, lost one man, and were beaten off," he answered with dry precision.
"And M. le Comte?"