"Exactly so, Catherine. Fortunately, ten minutes before the attack, one of Marc Divès's smugglers, Zimmer, the old dragoon, had come full gallop to warn us. Had it not been for that, we would have been lost. He fell in with our vanguard, after having run the gauntlet of a detachment of Cossacks on the plateau of Grosmann. The poor fellow had received a terrible sabre-thrust; and his bowels were protruding over the saddle--was it not so, Frantz?" "Yes," replied the hunter, sadly. "And what did he say?" demanded Catherine. "He had only time to cry, 'To arms! We are hemmed in! Jérome sends me. Labarbe is dead! The Germans have passed the Blutfeld!'" "He was a gallant fellow," exclaimed Catherine. "Yes, a gallant fellow," replied Frantz, with his head bent down. Then they relapsed into silence, and for some time the sledge swept through the winding valley. Now and then they were obliged to stop, the snow was so deep--when three or four mountaineers would take the horse by the bridle--and so they continued their way. "All the same," said Catherine, suddenly rousing up from her reverie, "Hullin might have told me." "But if he had mentioned these two attacks," interrupted the doctor, "you would have wanted to remain." "And who can hinder me from doing what I like? If it pleased me to get out of the sledge this very moment, should I not be free? I had forgiven Jean-Claude, but I am sorry for it!" "Oh, Maman Lefèvre, supposing he is killed while you are saying that!" murmured Louise. "She is right, poor child," thought Catherine; and then quickly added, "I said I was sorry for it; but he is such a good man, that one cannot be angry with him. I forgive him with all my heart; in his place I should have done the same." Two or three hundred yards farther on they entered the defile of Roches. The snow had ceased falling, and the moon was shining between great white clouds. The narrow gorge, hemmed in by steep precipices, expanded in the distance, its sides covered with tall pines. Nothing disturbed the deep calm of the woods; one could have imagined one's self far away from all human agitation. The silence was so great that every step the horse made in the snow could be heard, and even his sharp quick breathing. Frantz Materne halted at times to gaze upon the black slopes, and then hurried on to overtake the others. They crossed valley after valley; the sledge mounted and descended, now to the right and then to the left; and the partisans, with their bayonets fixed, followed continually.