"Yes, my Courte-Joie," said Maître Jacques, "the wolves are after us; but it gives me pleasure to have you take the trouble to come and warn me." Then, suddenly, "Ah, _ça!_" he cried; "how happens it that you can come? I thought you were caught when they took Jean Oullier? Jean Oullier got away, I know, as they crossed the ford,--there's nothing surprising in his escape; but you, my poor footless one,--how, in Heaven's name, did you get off?" "You forget Trigaud's feet," replied Aubin Courte-Joie, laughing. "I pricked the gendarme who held me, and it seems it hurt him, for he let go of me, and my friend Trigaud did the rest. But who told you that, Maître Jacques?" "Maître Jacques shrugged his shoulders with an indifferent air. Then, without replying to the question, which he may have thought an idle one,-- "Ah, _ça!_" he said; "I hope you haven't come to tell me that the day is changed?" "No; it is still for the 24th." "That's good," replied Maître Jacques; "for the fact is I've lost all patience with their delays and their shufflings. Good Lord! where's the need of such a fuss to pick up one's gun, say good-bye to one's wife, and be off?" "Patience! patience! you won't have long to wait now, Maître Jacques." "Four days!" said the other, in a tone of disgust. "That's not long." "I think it is too long by three. I didn't have Jean Oullier's chance to do for some of them at the springs of Baugé." "Yes; the _gars_ told me about that." "Unhappily," continued Maître Jacques, "they have taken a cruel revenge for it." "How so?" "Haven't you heard?" "No; I have just come straight from Montaigu." "Ah, true; then you can't know." "What happened?" "They caught and killed in Pascal Picaut's house a fine young man I respected,--I, who don't think any too much of his class usually." "What was his name?" "Comte de Bonneville." "Did they really? When was it?" "Why this very day, damn it! about two in the afternoon." "How, in the devil's name, did you hear that, down in your pit, Maître Jacques?" "Don't I hear everything that is of use to me?" "Then I don't know that there's any use in my telling you what brings me here." "Why not?" "Because you probably know it." "That may be." "I should like to be sure whether you do or not." "Pooh!" "Faith! yes, I should. It would spare me a disagreeable errand, which I only accepted against my will." "Ah! then you have come from _those gentlemen?_" Maître Jacques pronounced the words we have underscored in a tone that varied from contempt to menace. "Yes, I do, in the first instance," replied Aubin Courte-Joie; "but I met Jean Oullier on my way, and he, too, gave me a message for you." "Jean Oullier! Ah! anything that comes from him is welcome. He is a _gars_ I love,--Jean Oullier! He has done a thing in his life which made me his friend forever." "What was that?" "That's his secret, not mine. But come; tell me, in the first place, what those lordly gentlemen want of me?"