"Let me be taken!" cried the old man indignantly. "I would like to see them do so."
"Obey orders, Materne. An unarmed man will be released; an armed one shot. I need not tell you not to let those Germans know you come as a spy."
"I understand, Jean-Claude, and although I never parted yet with my rifle, you may take it, and my horn and knife. Who will lend me a blouse and staff?"
Nickel Bentz pulled off his blue smock-frock and hat, and passed them to the old man; and when he had donned them, no one would imagine the old hunter to be other than a simple peasant of the mountains.
His two sons, proud to be selected for such an expedition, reprimed their pieces, fixed their long, straight, wild-boar bayonets, and tried their hunting-knives in the sheaths; then, assured that everything was in proper order, they turned to go, their eyes sparkling with pleasure.
"Do not forget Jean-Claude's words," said Doctor Lorquin; "a German more or less makes little difference among a hundred thousand, but we should find it difficult to replace you."
"Fear nothing, doctor," replied old Materne. "My boys are hunters, and know how to bide their time, and profit by any chance that offers. And now, forward; we must be back before night."
Chapter XII.
Materne and his sons pursued their way for a long distance in silence. The weather was fine; the winter sun shone on the dazzling snow without thawing it, so that the path was firm and solid. Afar off, in the valley, the tall firs, pointed rocks, and the roofs of the houses, with their hanging icicles and little glittering windows and steep gables, were sharply outlined in the clear air, and in the street of Grandfontaine they could see a troop of young girls around the wash-house, and a few old men in cotton caps smoking their pipes at their cottage doors; but of all the busy life so plainly seen, not a sound reached their ears.
The old hunter halted at the edge of the wood, saying: