"Why, that M. Bonnet's black cat has kittens," said I.
I handed the paper back. The Colonel looked at it again, shrugged his shoulders, and laughed.
"Well, after all, perhaps it does mean no more than that," said he.
But for the Colonel's suspicions I should not have given another thought to that misspelt scrawl. M. Bonnet was probably some little peasant engrossed in domestic affairs, who thought that no message could be more consoling to his son locked up in Paris than this great news about the black cat.
The wildest rumours were flying about our camp at that time, as I think will always happen when you have a large body of men living under a great strain of cold and privation and peril. They perplexed the seasoned officers and they were readily swallowed by the youngsters, of whom I was one. Now, this scrap of paper happened to fit in with the rumour which most of all exercised our imaginations.
It was known that in spite of all our precautions news was continually leaking into Paris which we did not think it good for the Parisians to have. On that very Christmas Day they already knew that General Faidherbe, at Pont Noyelles, had repulsed a portion of our first army under General Manteuffel. How did they know? We were not satisfied that pigeons and balloons completely explained the mystery. No, we believed that the news passed somewhere through our lines on the south-east of Paris—news in cipher which was passed on and on to a house close to our lines, whence, as occasion served, it was carried into Paris.
That was the rumour. There may have been truth in it, or it may have been entirely false. But, at all events, it had just the necessary element of fancy to appeal to the imagination of a very young man, and as I walked to the stables and mounted the horse which the Colonel had lent me, I kept wondering whether this message, so simple in appearance, had travelled so, and was covering its last stage between the undiscovered château and Paris in the sealed wine-bottle. I tried to make out what the black cat stood for in the cipher, and whose identity was concealed under the pseudonym of M. Bonnet. So I rode down the slope of Noisy-le-Grand.
But at the bottom of the slope these speculations passed entirely from my mind. In front, hidden away in the darkness, lay the dangers of Ville Evrart and Maison Blanche. German soldiers had ridden along this path and had not returned; the francs-tireurs were abroad. Yet I must reach Raincy. Moreover, in my own mind, I was equally convinced that I must return. I saw the little beds against the wall of the hut under the sloping roof. I rode warily, determined to sleep in one of them that night, determined to keep my life if it could be kept.
I crossed the Marne and turned off the road into a forest path. Ville Evrart with its French garrison lay now upon my left behind the screen of trees. Fortunately there was no moon that night and a mist hung in the air. The snow, too, deadened the sound of my horse's hoofs. But I rode, nevertheless, very gently and with every sense alert. Each moment I expected the challenge of a sentinel in French.