Page:The Works of Honoré de Balzac Volume 29.djvu/61

Rh cartridges; then, during the skirmish, which will last longer than you look for, one of us could go for the National Guard and the Free Companies stationed at Fougères. We may be conscripts, but you shall see by that time that we are not carrion-kites."

"Then you think the Chouans are here in some force!"

"Judge for yourself, citizen-commandant."

He led Hulot to a spot on the plateau where the sand had been disturbed, as if a rake had been over it; and, after calling Hulot's attention to this, led him some little way along a footpath where traces of the passage of a large body of men were distinctly visible. Leaves had been trodden right into the trampled earth.

"That will be the gars from Vitré," said the Fougerais; "they have gone to join the Bas-Normands."

"What is your name, citizen?" asked Hulot.

"Gudin, commandant."

"Well, then, Gudin, I shall make you corporal of your townsmen here. You are a long-headed fellow, it seems to me. I leave it to you to pick out one of your comrades, who must be sent to Fougères, and you yourself will keep close beside me. But, first, there are these two poor comrades of ours that those brigands have laid out on the road there— you and some of your conscripts can go and take their guns, and clothes, and cartridge-boxes. You shall not stop here to take shots without returning them."

The brave Fougerais went to strip the dead, protected by an energetic fire kept up upon the woods by the whole company. It had its effect, for the party returned without losing a man.

"These Bretons will make good soldiers," said Hulot to Gérard, "if their mess happens to take their fancy."

Gudin's messenger set out at a trot down a pathway that turned off to the left through the woods. The soldiers, absorbed in examining their weapons, prepared for the coming struggle. The commandant passed them in review, smiled encouragingly, and, placing himself with his two favorite