This order quieted for a time the poor creature, who was moaning like
a child that has lost its nurse. At this moment Rouget, who hated Max,
thought his tormentor an angel. A passion like that of this miserable
old man for Flore is astonishingly like the emotions of childhood. At
six o'clock, the Pole, who had merely taken a walk, returned to
announce that Flore had driven towards Vatan.

"Madame is going back to her own people, that's plain," said Kouski.

"Would you like to go to Vatan to-night?" said Max. "The road is bad,
but Kouski knows how to drive, and you'll make your peace better
to-night than to-morrow morning."

"Let us go!" cried Rouget.

"Put the horse in quietly," said Max to Kouski; "manage, if you can,
that the town shall not know of this nonsense, for Monsieur Rouget's
sake. Saddle my horse," he added in a whisper. "I will ride on ahead
of you."

Monsieur Hochon had already notified Philippe of Flore's departure;
and the colonel rose from Monsieur Mignonnet's dinner-table to rush to
the place Saint-Jean; for he at once guessed the meaning of this
clever strategy. When Philippe presented himself at his uncle's house,
Kouski answered through a window that Monsieur Rouget was unable to
see any one.

"Fario," said Philippe to the Spaniard, who was stationed in the
Grande-Narette, "go and tell Benjamin to mount his horse; it is