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Page 17
The three joined a group of the Strangers, Captain Colton at their head,
and they stood there together, eating and drinking, their appetites made
wonderfully keen by the sharp morning and a hard life in the open air.
Bougainville, the little colonel, came from the next valley and remained
with them awhile. He was almost the color of an Indian now, but his
uniform was remarkably trim and clean and he bore himself with dignity.
He was distinctly a personality and John knew that no one would care to
undertake liberties with him.
In the long months following the battle on the Marne Bougainville had
done great deeds. Again and again he had thrown his regiment into some
weak spot in the line just at the right moment. He seemed, like Napoleon
and Stonewall Jackson, to have an extraordinary, intuitive power of
divining the enemy's intentions, and General Vaugirard, to whose command
his regiment belonged, never hesitated to consult him and often took his
advice. "Ah, that child of Montmartre!" he would say. "He will go far,
if he does not meet a shell too soon. He keeps a hand of steel on his
regiment, there is no discipline sterner than his, and yet his men love
him."
Bougainville showed pleasure at seeing John again, and gave him his hand
American fashion.
"We both still live," he said briefly.
"And hope for complete victory."
"We do," said Bougainville, earnestly, "but it will take all the
strength of the allied nations to achieve it. Much has happened,
Monsieur Scott, since we stood that day in the lantern of Basilique du
Sacr�-Coeur on the Butte Montmartre and saw the Prussian cavalry riding
toward Paris."
"But what has happened is much less than that which will happen before
this war is over."
"You speak a great truth, Monsieur Scott. And now I must go. Hearing
that the Strangers were in this valley I wished to come and see with my
own eyes that you were alive and well. I have seen and I am glad."
He saluted, Captain Colton and the others saluted in return, and then he
walked over the hill to his own "children."
"An antique! An old Roman! Spirit defying death," said Captain Colton
looking after him.
"He has impressed me that way, too, sir," said John. But his mind
quickly left Bougainville, and turned to the message that Weber had
brought the night before. He was glad that Julie Lannes would be so near
again, and yet he was sorry. He had not been sorry when he first heard
it, but the apprehension had come later. He tried to trace the cause,
and then he remembered the name of Auersperg, the prince whom his
cousin, the Austrian captive, had said was near. He sought to laugh at
himself for his fears. The mental connection was too vague, he said, but
the relieving laughter would not come.
John hoped that a lucky chance might bring Lannes, and involuntarily he
looked up at the heavens. But they were clear of aeroplanes. The heavy
snow of the night before had driven in the hosts of the air, and they
had not reappeared.
Then John resolved to go to Chastel himself. He did not know how he
would go or what he would do when he got there, but the impulse was
strong and it remained with him.
CHAPTER III
JULIE'S COMING
That day, the next night and the next day passed without any event save
the usual desultory firing of cannon and rifles. Many men were killed
and more were wounded by the sharpshooters. Little battles were fought
at distant points along the lines, the Allies winning some while the
Germans were victorious in others, but the result was nothing. The
deadlock was unbroken.
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