"Forward, forward!" cried Marc; "we will overtake you in a few minutes."
"But what are you going to do with the wagon?" asked Frantz. "Since we have not time to bring it to Falkenstein, we had better leave it under Cuny's shed than to abandon it in the middle of the road."
"Yes, and have the poor old man hung when the Cossacks return, as they will in less than an hour," replied Dives. "Do not trouble yourself; I have a notion in my head."
Frantz rejoined the party around the sledge, who had gone on some distance. Soon they passed the sawmill of Marquis, and struck straight to the right, to reach the farm-house of Bois-de-Chênes, the high chimney of which appeared over the plateau, three quarters of a league away. When they were on the crest of the hill, Marc-Dives and his men came up, shouting,
"Halt! Stop a moment. Look yonder!"
And all, turning their eyes to the bottom of the gorge, saw the Cossacks caracoling about the wagon to the number of two or three hundred.
"They are coming! Let us fly!" cried Louise.
"Wait a moment," replied the smuggler; "we have nothing to fear."
He was yet speaking, when a sheet of flame spread its purple wings from one mountain to the other, lighting the woods to their topmost branches, and the rocks, and the forester's lodge fifteen hundred feet below; then followed a crash that shook the earth.