“A moi!”

“You, Philippe?” exclaimed Fevrier.

“That was a timely cry,” and he sprang back.  There were six men standing, and the six saluted Fevrier; they were all Frenchmen.  Fevrier mopped his forehead.

“But that was fine,” said he, “though what’s to come will be still better.  Oh, but we will make this night memorable to our friends.  They shall talk of us by their firesides when they are grown old and France has had many years of peace—­we shall not hear, but they will talk of us, the deserters from Metz.”

Lieutenant Fevrier in a word was exalted, and had lost his sense of proportion.  He did not, however, relax his activity.  He sent off the six to gather the rest of his contingent.  He made an examination of the Prussians, and found that sixteen had been killed outright, and eight were lying wounded.  He removed their rifles and ammunition out of reach, and from dead and wounded alike took the coats and caps.  To the wounded he gave instead French uniforms; and then, bidding twenty-three of his soldiers don the Prussian caps and coats, he snatched a moment wherein to run to the cure.

“It is over,” said he.  “The Prussians will not burn Vaudere to-night.”  And he jumped down the stairs again without waiting for any response.  In the street he put on the cap and coat of the Prussian officer, buckled the sword about his waist, and thrust the revolver into his belt.  He had now twenty-three men who at night might pass for Prussians, and thirteen others.

To these thirteen he gave general instructions.  They were to spread out on the right and left, and make their way singly up through the vines, and past the field-watch if they could without risk of detection.  They were to join him high up on the slope, and opposite to the bonfire which would be burning at the repli.  His twenty-three he led boldly, following as nearly as possible the track by which the Prussians had descended.  The party trampled down the vine-poles, brushed through the leaves, and in a little while were challenged.

“Sadowa,” said Fevrier, in his best imitation of the German accent.

“Pass Sadowa,” returned the sentry.

Fevrier and his men filed upwards.  He halted some two hundred yards farther on, and went down upon his knees.  The soldiers behind him copied his example.  They crept slowly and cautiously forward until the flames of the bonfire were visible through the screen of leaves, until the faces of the officers about the bonfire could be read.

Then Fevrier stopped and whispered to the soldier next to him.  That soldier passed the whisper on, and from a file the Frenchmen crept into line.  Fevrier had now nothing to do but to wait; and he waited without trepidation or excitement.  The night from first to last had gone very well with him.  He could even think of Mareschal Bazaine without anger.