Lieutenant Rochas meantime had yielded to an irresistible impulse and seated himself on the ground. He attempted to give an order. “Corporal, you will—you will—” And that was as far as he could proceed, for fatigue sealed his lips, and like the rest he suddenly sank down and was lost in slumber. Jean, not caring to share his comrades’ fate and pillow his head on the hard stones, moved away; he was bent on finding a bed in which to sleep. At a window of the Hotel of the Golden Cross, on the opposite side of the square, he caught a glimpse of General Bourgain-Desfeuilles, already half-undressed and on the point of tasting the luxury of clean white sheets. Why should he be more self-denying than the rest of them? he asked himself; why should he suffer longer? And just then a name came to his recollection that caused him a thrill of delight, the name of the manufacturer in whose employment Maurice’s brother-in-law was. M. Delaherche! yes, that was it. He accosted an old man who happened to be passing. “Can you tell me where M. Delaherche lives?” “In the Rue Maqua, near the corner of the Rue au Beurre; you can’t mistake it; it is a big house, with statues in the garden.” The old man turned away, but presently came running back. “I see you belong to the 106th. If it is your regiment you are looking for, it left the city by the Château, down there. I just met the colonel, Monsieur de Vineuil; I used to know him when he lived at Mézières.” But Jean went his way, with an angry gesture of impatience. No, no! no sleeping on the hard ground for him, now that he was certain of finding Maurice. And yet he could not help feeling a twinge of remorse as he thought of the dignified old colonel, who stood fatigue so manfully in spite of his years, sharing the sufferings of his men, with no more luxurious shelter than his tent. He strode across the Grande Rue with rapid steps and soon was in the midst of the tumult and uproar of the city; there he hailed a small boy, who conducted him to the Rue Maqua.