sky-blue jacket, his wide red trousers with blue stripes and red
woolen belt, with his sun-dried face and strong, sinewy limbs that
indicated great strength and activity.

"Hallo! it's Monsieur Maurice! I'm glad to see you!"

He took things very easily, however, conducting the steaming horses to
the stable, and to his own, more particularly, giving a paternal
attention. It was no doubt his affection for the noble animal,
contracted when he was a boy and rode him to the plow, that had made
him select the cavalry arm of the service.

"We've just come in from Monthois, more than ten leagues at a
stretch," he said when he came back, "and Poulet will be wanting his
breakfast."

Poulet was the horse. He declined to eat anything himself; would only
accept a cup of coffee. He had to wait for his officer, who had to
wait for the Emperor; he might be five minutes, and then again he
might be two hours, so his officer had told him to put the horses in
the stable. And as Maurice, whose curiosity was aroused, showed some
disposition to pump him, his face became as vacant as a blank page.

"Can't say. An errand of some sort--papers to be delivered."

But Rochas looked at the chasseur with an eye of tenderness, for the
uniform awakened old memories of Africa.

"Eh! my lad, where were you stationed out there?"