Thérence was pacified; but Brulette and I, who knew how dogged and obstinate Joseph could be under his gentle manner, and remembered how he had left us without allowing us a chance to remonstrate or persuade him, felt sure that his mind was already fully made up, and that no one could change it. During the next two days I once more felt dreadfully dull; and so did Brulette, though she amused herself by finishing the embroidery she wanted to give Thérence, and spent some hours in the woods with Père Bastien, partly to leave Joseph to the care of Thérence, and partly to talk of Huriel and comfort the worthy man for the danger and distress the fight had caused him. The Head-Woodsman, touched by the friendship which she showed him, told her the truth about Malzac, and, far from her blaming Huriel, as the latter had feared, it only drew her closer to him through the gratitude which she now felt she owed him. On the sixth day we began to talk of separating. Joseph was getting better hourly; he worked a little, and did his best in every way to recover his strength. He had decided to go with us and spend a few days at home, saying that he should return almost immediately to the woods of Alleu,--which Brulette and I doubted, and so did Thérence, who was almost as uneasy about his health as she had been about his illness. I don't know if it was she who persuaded her father to accompany us half-way, or whether the notion came into Père Bastien's own mind; at any rate, he made us the offer, which Brulette instantly accepted. Joseph was only half pleased at this, though he tried not to show it. The little trip naturally diverted the Head-Woodsman's thoughts from his anxieties, and while making his preparations the evening before our departure he recovered much of his natural fine spirits. The muleteers had left the neighborhood without hindrance, and nothing had been said about Malzac, who had neither relations nor friends to inquire for him. A year or two might go by before the authorities troubled themselves to know what had become of him, and indeed, they might never do so; for in those days there was no great policing in France, and a man might disappear without any notice being taken of it. Moreover, the Head-Woodsman and his family would leave those parts at the end of the chopping season, and as father and son never stayed six months in the same place, the law would be very clever indeed to know where to catch them. For these reasons the Head-Woodsman, who had feared only the first results of the affair, finding that no one got wind of the secret, grew easy in mind and so restored our courage. On the morning of the eighth day he put us all into a little cart he had borrowed, together with a horse, from a friend of his in the forest, and taking the reins he drove us by the longest but safest road to Saint-Sevère, where we were to part from him and his daughter.