A cold and grey light was in the sky when La Vireville came back to consciousness, and, for the moment greatly puzzled, raised his head and looked about him. There was no fallen horse, no sign of hussars, nothing left of the night's doings but a sick feeling in the mouth, a bruised shoulder, and a foot that ached ten thousand times worse than he had ever thought a foot could ache. But, as he struggled to one elbow, he saw another relic--he tricolour sash about his body. He surveyed it without much approbation. Was it that symbol which had saved him? No; it had been too dark when he came down; they could not have seen it. Had they thought him killed, then, and ridden off and left him? Hardly, because if they knew whom they were hunting, which was probable, they would have been anxious for the reward, since he was equally marketable alive or dead--did he not carry that guarantee on his person? And where was his wounded horse? He came at last to the conclusion that his steed must have picked itself up and galloped on, and that the hussars had pursued it, not seeing that it was riderless, or that their quarry was lying at their mercy by the échalier. They must almost have ridden over him as he lay senseless. All of which was very miraculous, and seemed to denote a special care on the part of Providence that was encouraging. "If only the brute had chosen my other foot to roll on!" thought the victim. "But of course he would not!" However, long as the grass was, and early as the hour, it was unbecoming to lie there like a lame sheep and wait to be picked up. A coppice ran along the side of this second field, and towards this, on his hands and knees, the ends of the tricolour sash dragging in the wet grass, La Vireville made his way. And in the coppice, having drunk some brandy, cut off his slashed boot and applied the same restorative to his swollen foot, he very stoically lay down under an oak, thinking to sleep. That solace, however, he could not compass; his foot hurt too much. Moreover, he had a fairly knotty problem to solve--how best to remove himself from his present environment to a safer. And he saw no way, short of crawling or hopping. For even if he were physically capable of working his way towards Carhoët he could only safely do it under cover of darkness, and for darkness, near as he was to Porhoët, he could not afford to wait. "I was really better in my cupboard," he reflected. Certainly his knight-errantry, if it had proved of any avail for the lady--which was more than doubtful--had left its author in no happy plight.