"It is ready, Master Jean-Claude." Then, looking into the kitchen, "Grédel! Grédel! bring Hullin's parcel." A little woman appeared, and put down on the table a roll of sheepskins. Jean-Claude passed his stick through it, and lifted it over his shoulder. "What, you are going to leave us so soon?" "Yes, Wittmann. The days are short, and the roads difficult through the forests after six o'clock. I must get back early." "Then a safe journey to you, Master Jean-Claude." Hullin left, and crossed the square, turning away his face from the convoy, which still remained before the church. The innkeeper from his window watched him hurrying away, and thought to himself, "How white he looked on entering; he could hardly keep upright. It is queer that such a sturdy man, and an old soldier too, should not have energy enough for a cat. As for me, I would see fifty regiments go by on those carts without minding it any more than I did my first pipe." CHAPTER IV MADAME LEFÈVRE While Hullin was learning the disaster of our armies, and was walking slowly, his head bent, and an anxious expression on his face, toward the village of Charmes, everything went on as usual at the farm of Bois-de-Chênes. No one thought of Yégof's wonderful stories, or of the war: old Duchêne led his oxen to their drinking-place, the herdsman Robin turned over their litter; Annette and Jeanne skimmed their curdled milk. Only Catherine Lefèvre was silent and gloomy--thinking of days gone by--all the while superintending with an impassible face the occupations of her domestics. She was too old and too serious to forget from one day to another what had so much troubled her. When night came on, after the evening's repast, she entered the great room, where her servants could hear her drawing the large register-book from the closet and putting it on the table, to sum up her accounts, as she was in the habit of doing. They soon began to load the cart with corn, vegetables, and poultry: for the next day there was a market at Sarrebourg, and Duchêne had to start early.