air and the conflagration subsided. It was only the pile of green wood
that had been so long the object of Loubet's and Lapoulle's care, and
which, after having smoldered for many hours, had at last flashed up
like a fire of straw.

Jean, alarmed by the vivid light, hastily left the tent and was near
falling over Maurice, who had raised himself on his elbow. The
darkness seemed by contrast more opaque than it had been before, and
the two men lay stretched on the bare ground, a few paces from each
other. All that they could descry before them in the dense shadows of
the night was the window of the farm-house, faintly illuminated by the
dim candle, which shone with a sinister gleam, as if it were doing
duty by the bedside of a corpse. What time was it? two o'clock, or
three, perhaps. It was plain that the staff had not made acquaintance
with their beds that night. They could hear Bourgain-Desfeuilles'
loud, disputatious voice; the general was furious that his rest should
be broken thus, and it required many cigars and toddies to pacify him.
More telegrams came in; things must be going badly; silhouettes of
couriers, faintly drawn against the uncertain sky line, could be
descried, galloping madly. There was the sound of scuffling steps,
imprecations, a smothered cry as of a man suddenly stricken down,
followed by a blood-freezing silence. What could it be? Was it the
end? A breath, chill and icy as that from the lips of death, had
passed over the camp that lay lost in slumber and agonized
expectation.

It was at that moment that Jean and Maurice recognized in the tall,
thin, spectral form that passed swiftly by, their colonel, de Vineuil.
He was accompanied by the regimental surgeon, Major Bouroche, a large
man with a leonine face They were conversing in broken, unfinished