“Arrived at the gate-house the young lieutenant asked for the officer in command--Captain Saussier. So Captain Saussier came out, and madame went through all her story again. The captain ogled her, and it was all I could do to keep my countenance when I saw that the captain and the lieutenant were trying to cut one another out. They made no bones at all of taking her to see the commandant, particularly as she said she did not wish to stay, except until daylight the next morning, for in a besieged town they don’t want any non-combatants to eat up the provender. But although they were willing enough for her to go in, they refused to let me. She made no objection to this, which surprised me; but in a moment she fell into one of those fits we had rehearsed for the commandant’s benefit, when he should tell her, as we knew he would, that he had never seen or heard of her husband. I came forward then with smelling-salts, and presently she revived. That scared the officers a little, for the bravest officer in the world would rather be out of the way when a woman begins to cry and kick and scream. As soon as they led her towards the gate she had another fit, and as good a fit as I ever saw in my life, sir. Then I came running, of course, with the smelling-salts. The captain evidently did not want her on his hands entirely as long as she was in that condition, so he said perhaps--ahem!--it might be better to take her servant along. “‘Oh, my good, faithful Jacques!’ cried she. ‘It would be a great comfort if I could have him with me in this trying time!’ So they passed me in the gates along with her. “She never stopped chattering for a moment while she was walking through the streets with the captain, telling a long rigmarole about her travels; but she used her eyes as well as I used mine. The town was horribly knocked to pieces--houses falling down, the streets encumbered with rubbish, and several breaches made in the walls. They had managed to repair the breaches after a fashion, for the French understand fortifications better than we do; but there was no doubt, from what we saw in that walk at nine o’clock at night, that the town and fortifications had suffered terribly. And there were no women or children to be seen, which showed that they had sent them all away, for some will remain in a besieged town as long as there is anything to feed them on.