es the shepherd's blankets."

Madame Lecacheur, who was seized by a fresh access of rage, of rage
increased by a married woman's anger against debauchery, exclaimed:

"It is she, I am sure. Go there. Ah, the blackguard thieves!"

But the brigadier was quite unmoved.

"One minute," he said. "Let us wait until twelve o'clock, as he goes and
dines there every day. I shall catch them with it under their noses."

The gendarme smiled, pleased at his chief's idea, and Lecacheur also
smiled now, for the affair of the shepherd struck him as very funny;
deceived husbands are always a joke.

Twelve o'clock had just struck when the brigadier, followed by his man,
knocked gently three times at the door of a little lonely house, situated
at the corner of a wood, five hundred yards from the village.

They had been standing close against the wall, so as not to be seen from
within, and they waited. As nobody answered, the brigadier knocked again
in a minute or two. It was so quiet that the house seemed uninhabited;
but Lenient, the gendarme, who had very quick ears, said that he heard
somebody moving about inside, and then Senateur got angry. He would not
allow any one to resist the authority of the law for a moment, and,
knocking at the door with the hilt of his sword, he cried out:

"Open the door, in the name of the law."

As this order had no effect, he roared out:

"If you do not obey, I shall smash the lock. I am the brigadier of the
gendarmerie, by G--! Here, Lenient."

He had not finished speaking when the door opened and Senateur saw before
him a fat girl, with a very red, blowzy face, with drooping breasts, a
big stomach and broad hips, a sort of animal, the wife of the shepherd
Severin, and he went into the cottage.

"I have come to pay you a visit, as I want to make a little search," he
said, and he looked about him. On the table there was a plate, a jug of
cider and a glass half full, which proved that a meal was in progress.
Two knives were lying side by side, and the shrewd gendarme winked at his
superior officer.

"It smells good," the latter said.

"One might swear that it was stewed rabbit," Lenient added, much amused.

"Will you have a glass of brandy?" the peasant woman asked.

"No, thank you; I only want the skin of the rabbit that you are eating."

She pretended not to understand, but she was trembling.

"What rabbit?"

The brigadier had taken a seat, and was calmly wiping his forehead.

"Com