d more intense,
and in spite of the numberless privations that awaited her, she
persisted in accompanying her husband. He was obliged to give way to
her, and they all three, the captain, his wife, and our comrade, started
on their expedition.

Going was nothing in comparison to returning. They were obliged to
travel by night, so as to avoid meeting anybody, as the possession of
six rifles would have made them liable to suspicion. But, in spite of
everything, a week after leaving us, the captain and his two men were
back with us again. The campaign was about to begin.

III

The first night of his arrival he began it himself, and, under pretext
of examining the surrounding country, he went along the high road.

I must tell you that the little village which served as our fortress was
a small collection of poor, badly built houses, which had been deserted
long before. It lay on a steep slope, which terminated in a wooded
plain. The country people sell the wood; they send it down the slopes,
which are called coulees, locally, and which lead down to the plain,
and there they stack it into piles, which they sell thrice a year to the
wood merchants. The spot where this market is held in indicated by two
small houses by the side of the highroad, which serve for public houses.
The captain had gone down there by way of one of these coulees.

He had been gone about half an hour, and we were on the lookout at the
top of the ravine, when we heard a shot. The captain had ordered us not
to stir, and only to come to him when we heard him blow his trumpet. It
was made of a goat's horn, and could be heard a league off; but it gave
no sound, and, in spite of our cruel anxiety, we were obliged to wait in
silence, with our rifles by our side.

It is nothing to go down these coulees; one just lets one's self slide
down; but it is more difficult to get up again; one has to scramble up
by catching hold of the hanging branches of the trees, and sometimes on
all fours, by sheer strength. A whole mortal hour passed, and he did not
come; nothing moved in the brushwood. The captain's wife began to grow
impatient. What could he be doing? Why did he not call us? Did the shot
that we had heard proceed from an enemy, and had he killed or wounded
our leader, her husband? They did not know what to think, but I myself
fancied either that he was dead or that his enterprise was successful;
and I was merely anxious and curious to know what he had do