"They have passed the enemy's lines; they are hastening to Lutzelbourg; I see them. Gaspard and Dives are in the van with Desmarets, Ulrich, Weber, and our friends of the city. They are coming! they are coming!"
She was again silent. They listened long, but the vision had vanished. Minutes followed minutes that seemed centuries, when at once Hexe-Baizel's sharp voice arose:
"She is a fool! She saw nothing. I know Marc. He is mocking us. What is it to him if we perish! So long as he has his bottle of wine and his dinner, and his pipe after, what does he care? O the villain!"
Then all was silence again, and the wretches whose hearts were for a moment animated with the hope of speedy deliverance, again sank back in despair.
"It was a dream," thought they:
"Hexe-Baizel is right; we are doomed to die of hunger."
Night had fallen. When the moon rose behind the tall firs, shedding her pale light on the mournful groups, Hullin alone watched, although fever was burning his vitals. He listened to every sound from the gorges. The voices of the German sentries called their Wer da! Wer da! as the rounds passed the bivouacs; the horses neighed shrilly, and their grooms shouted. At last, toward midnight, the brave old man fell asleep like the others. When he awoke, the clock of the village of Charmes was striking four. Hullin, at the sound of its far-off vibrations, started from his stupor, opened his eyes, and, while he gazed upward trying to collect his senses, a dim light like the flare of a torch passed before his eyes. Fear seized him, and he muttered:
"Am I going mad? The night is dark, and yet I see torches!"
The flame reappeared; he saw it more clearly; he arose and pressed his hand for some seconds upon his brow. At last, risking a glance, he saw distinctly a fire on Giromani, on the other side of Blanru, flinging its red glare in the sky, and throwing black shadows from the firs on the snow. Suddenly he remembered that it was the signal agreed on between Pivrette and himself to announce an attack; he trembled from head to foot; a cold sweat poured from his forehead, and groping through the darkness like a blind man with arms outstretched, he stammered:
"Catherine! Louise! Jerome!"