Hullin had lit his pipe, and seemed absent and thoughtful; it was plain that he was uneasy about something. After a few moments, seeing Gaspard's appetite begin to relax, he abruptly exclaimed: "But tell us, Gaspard, if I may make so bold as to ask, how does it happen that you are here? We thought you were still on the Strasbourg side of the Rhine!"
"Ah! ha! old boy, I understand," said young Lefévre, with a knowing wink; "there are so many deserters; is it not so?"
"Oh! such an idea as that would never enter my head! and yet----"
"You would not be sorry to know if we are all right and correct! I don't blame you, Papa Jean-Claude; you are quite right; those who don't answer to the muster-roll when the _kaiserlicks_ are in France, richly deserve to be shot! Make your mind happy; there's my leave."
Hullin, who had no false delicacy, read: "Twenty-four hours' leave of absence to Grenadier Gaspard Lefévre, of the 2nd company of the 1st regiment.--January the 3rd, 1814. GEMEAU, chief of the battalion." "Good, good," said he; "put it up in your knapsack; you might chance to lose it."
"Look you, my children," said he, "I know what love is; there is bad and good about it; but it is bad in particular for young soldiers who come too near their homes after a campaign. They are capable of forgetting all and everything till they find themselves brought back with two or three gendarmes at their heels. I've seen that happen before now. But, however, since everything is clear and straightforward here, let's drain a bumper of _rikevir_. What say you, Catherine? The men of the Sarre may arrive from one moment to the next, and we have not an instant to lose."
"You say well, Jean-Claude," replied the old farm-mistress, sadly. "Go down and bring up three bottles from the little cellar, Annette."
The servant-girl ran quickly out at her mistress's orders.
"But this leave, Gaspard," continued Catherine, "how much longer has it to run?"
"I received it yesterday, at eight in the evening, at Vasselonne, mother. The regiment is in retreat upon Lorraine; I must rejoin it this evening at Phalsbourg."
"Well and good; you have still seven hours before you. It will not take you more than six to get there, though there is a good deal of snow at Foxthâl."