“Well, go your way,” he said, slapping me on the shoulder, “and good luck go with you. At the fête, citizen, drink a health to old Dubosq. As for me, I have the pleasant duty of burying my dead, and reporting to my superiors that I am a fool and that the trap is empty;” and he glowered angrily down the road, his mustache drooping dismally. “Your turn will come,” I urged. “Or if not yours, mine--of that I am certain.” “Yes,” he agreed, with a growl, “I will yet get my hands on him, and when I do, he will have reason to remember it. Adieu, citizen,” he added. “My compliments to the lady. Come, my children, march!” And he and his soldiers set off toward Tours, bearing their dead with them. I watched them for a few moments with something like regret. After all, Dubosq had spoken truly. I had seen little of the world, and he had offered me a chance to see more in gallant company. I could not but admit that he would have made an admirable guide and companion. If his cockade were only white! But even then I could not have followed him. For I was not free--another duty lay before me. Would I ever be free, I wondered--free to march away whither I listed, to live a man’s life and grow to man’s stature? Or would I always be tied to some woman’s petticoat, imprisoned in a trivial round of daily duties, as were so many men? Was I on this journey simply exchanging one petticoat for another? With such thoughts for companions,--surely less pleasant than Dubosq!--I turned my face again to the south, and strode along with such speed as my legs could compass. I am not fond of foot-exercise, and it was not at all in this ridiculous fashion that I had thought to make the journey to Poitiers. Besides there was need that my entry into that city should be made with a certain dignity, and I knew well that the whole contents of my purse would not purchase a new horse, to say nothing of a new equipment. For the horse was not all that I had lost. In the holsters of the saddle was a pair of handsome pistols which had belonged to my father, and in the portmanteau strapped behind it an array of gallant clothing such as I had never possessed before, and would in all likelihood never again possess. As to replenishing my purse, I remembered only too acutely how my mother had pinched herself for months to provide me with this outfit. No, decidedly, to repair this misfortune I had only my own prowess to depend upon, and I am free to say that it was not of a quality greatly to enhearten me. Certainly my first adventure in the world had ended most disastrously.