at there was a ferry lower down the
stream, at Villers, and trusting to luck to befriend him, he shaped his
course for that village, striking across the meadows and tilled fields
of the right bank. All went well enough at first; they had only to dodge
a cavalry patrol which forced them to hide in the shadow of a wall and
remain there half an hour. Then the rain began to come down in earnest
and his progress became more laborious, compelled as he was to tramp
through the sodden fields beside the horse, which fortunately showed
itself to be a fine specimen of the equine race, and perfectly gentle.
On reaching Villers he found that his trust in the blind goddess,
Fortune, had not been misplaced; the ferryman, who, at that late hour,
had just returned from setting a Bavarian officer across the river,
took them at once and landed them on the other shore without delay or
accident.

And it was not until they reached the village, where they narrowly
escaped falling into the clutches of the pickets who were stationed
along the entire length of the Remilly road, that their dangers and
hardships really commenced; again they were obliged to take to the
fields, feeling their way along blind paths and cart-tracks that
could scarcely be discerned in the darkness. The most trivial obstacle
sufficed to drive them a long way out of their course. They squeezed
through hedges, scrambled down and up the steep banks of ditches, forced
a passage for themselves through the densest thickets. Jean, in whom
a low fever had developed under the drizzling rain, had sunk down
crosswise on his saddle in a condition of semi-consciousness, holding on
with both hands by the horse's mane, while Maurice, who had slipped the
bridle over his right arm, had to steady him by the legs to keep him
from tumbling to the ground. For more than a league, for two long,
weary hours that seemed like an eternity, did they toil onward in this
fatiguing way; floundering, stumbling, slipping in such a manner that it
seemed at every moment as if men and beast must land together in a heap
at the bottom of some descent. The spectacle they presented was one of
utter, abject misery, besplashed with mud, the horse trembling in every
limb, the man upon his back a helpless mass, as if at his last gasp, the
other, wild-eyed and pale as death, keeping his feet only by an effort
of fraternal love. Day was breaking; it was not far from five o'clock
when at last they came to Remilly.