LITMIR.BIZ

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was no hope, he knew; at any moment the snow might begin again, and this lovely life must go out as the other lives were going out, unnoticed, unsweetened by any care, regret, or tenderness.

      But it never occurred to M. de Vauvenargues to leave him, though he knew that his own best, perhaps his only, chance of life lay in movement, in pressing on.

      The darkness fell slowly and with a certain dreadful heaviness; the added ugliness of the distant bark of wolves completed the speechless horror of the Marquis’s mood.

      Still the army was trailing past him, bent figures supporting each other, a few Generals still on horseback, a few wounded and women in sledges or carts.

      From an officer of the Black Musqueteers he begged a little wine that brought a tinge of colour into d’Espagnac’s cheeks and proved how pitifully easy it would have been to save him by warmth and care.

      “There is only rough nursing here, Monsieur,” said the musqueteer kindly; “leave him and save your own life, for I think the snow will begin again.”

      “Monsieur,” replied the Marquis gently, “he is so very young. And maybe he will be conscious before he dies, and find himself alone and hear the wolves. And it is such a little thing I do.”

      And still the army went past like a procession in a dream of hell, and every moment it became darker, until the fir trees and the rocks were being lost in blackness and the howls of the wolves sounded nearer. Presently came a woman walking with more energy than most, yet stumbling under some burden that she held in her arms. At that moment d’Espagnac suddenly recovered consciousness, and cried in a clear voice—

      “Let us get on our way, my dear Marquis—we ought to be at Eger to-morrow night.”

      The words made the woman pause and look round. The Marquis gazed at her; he had last seen her on a white horse beneath a silver fir; and though he had forgotten her since, he had now a passionate desire that she should stop and speak to him.

      As if in answer to this wish, she crossed directly to the wagon. The young Count had fallen into a weak swoon again, and she looked down on him calmly.

      “Your friend is dying,” she said. “My God, how many more!”

      She sat down on a round grey stone and put her hand to her head; then the Marquis saw that she carried, wrapped to her breast, a small sick child.

      “You must go on,” he said, with energy. “You must not stop for us, Mademoiselle.”

      “I cannot walk any more,” she answered. “I am very strong, but I cannot walk farther.”

      “Where is your brother?” he asked.

      “Dead,” she replied.

      “Dead!”

      “The word seems to mean nothing. I have a child here, dying too. I thought it might be happier dying in some one’s arms.”

      It was exactly his own thought about Georges; he smiled with his courteous, sad sweetness, and putting the lieutenant’s head gently on one of the still rolled-up curtains, rose.

      “We are on the heights, are we not?” asked Carola. “I seem to have been climbing all day.”

      He approached her. “I think we are very high up,” he said gently. “Will you give me the child, Mademoiselle?”

      She resigned the pitiful burden without a word; the Marquis shuddered as he felt the frail weight in his arms.

      “So cold,” he murmured. “How could they bring children on such a march as this! How far have you carried him?” he added.

      “Since morning,” answered Carola; “and it is a girl, Monsieur.”

      The Marquis looked down into the tiny crumpled white face in the folds of the fur mantle, and laid the little creature down beside d’Espagnac.

      “What can we do?” asked the Countess, in a broken voice.

      “Nothing,” he answered gravely; “but if you have any strength at all, you should join the march. It is your only chance, Mademoiselle.”

      She shook her delicate head. “Please permit me to stay with you. We might help each other. This is very terrible—the wolves are the worst.” She set her lips, and her pinched face had a look of decided strength. “Will the army be passing all night?” she added.

      “I do not think so—surely there cannot be many more.”

      “I was thinking when they go—perhaps the wolves——” She paused.

      He was unused to these severe latitudes; there were wolves in France, but they had never troubled him.

      “They might attack us,” she finished, seeing he did not comprehend.

      He took his pistols from his belt and laid them on the ground beside him.

      “I am armed,” he answered.

      The Countess rose stiffly; her thick fur-lined cloak fell apart and showed the bright colours of her dress beneath, the tags and braids of gold, the vermilion sash and ruffled laces. “It is strange that I should live and my brother die, is it not?” she said wearily. “He fell from his horse and struck his head on a broken gun. Then he died very quickly.” There was dried blood on her fur gloves and on the bosom of her shirt. She went to the unconscious child and knelt beside her, moved the wrappings from the pallid, dead-coloured face, and touched the cheek. “I think she will never wake again—but your friend?” She glanced at the Marquis, who was standing looking down at M. d’Espagnac.

      “I can only watch him die,” he said.

      The Countess drew from her bosom the flask she had offered to M. de Vauvenargues four days before.

      “This was filled this morning,” she explained, “and I cannot take it for it makes me giddy.” She moved to the side of M. d’Espagnac and raised his head tenderly and forced the spirits between his teeth.

      “I think there is a lantern in the wagon,” said the Marquis, and went to find it. The dark was now so thick that they could scarcely see each other’s features, but he found the lantern and flint and tinder and lit it, and the long yellow beams were some comfort in the overwhelming sadness of the night.

      The effect of the brandy on M. d’Espagnac was sudden and almost terrible: he sat up amid the tumbled rolls of silk, and his cheeks were red with fever and his eyes open in a forced fashion. He appeared clear-headed and master of his senses; his glance rested on the Polish lady and then on the Marquis. “You should not have waited for me,” he muttered. “On—on to Eger. I shall soon be well.” He raised his wasted, bleeding hands to his brilliant hair. “I am sick from seeing people die,” he said. “It could never have been meant. O God, what have we done?” He crossed himself.

      “This is war, Georges,” answered the Marquis. “Remember the chapel of St. Wenceslas and the words we spoke there.”

      M. d’Espagnac shuddered and fell back on to the cloaks the Marquis had piled under his head. Carola took his poor torn hand.

      “Rest a little longer,” she said, “and then we can continue on our way.”

      Save for a few stragglers, the army had passed now. The isolation seemed to increase with the dark, and the greedy howls of the wolves came nearer.

      The lieutenant struggled up again and cried impetuously, “I am not going to die! That would be folly, for I have done nothing yet.”

      “No, you shall not die,” answered Carola, and grasped his hand tighter. The Marquis was on the other side of him. Georges d’Espagnac laughed.

      “You must not wait for me, Monsieur.” Then he closed his eyes, and shiver after shiver shook his limbs.

      The baby stirred and wailed dismally; in a moment Carola had it caught

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