“I had no wish for a ball in the thigh, for I should have had to stop where I was in that case, and there would have been no going back to the chateau, but I was not particular; a nice wound in the arm I should have liked best, so that I might be nursed and made much of by the princess.  I flung myself on the enemy, like mad; but I had no sort of luck, and came out of the action quite safe and sound.  We must march, and there was an end of it; I never saw the countess again, and there is the whole story.”

By this time they had reached Benassis’ house; the doctor mounted his horse at once and disappeared.  Genestas recommended his son to Jacquotte’s care, so the doctor on his return found that she had taken Adrien completely under her wing, and had installed him in M. Gravier’s celebrated room.  With no small astonishment, she heard her master’s order to put up a simple camp-bed in his own room, for that the lad was to sleep there, and this in such an authoritative tone, that for once in her life Jacquotte found not a single word to say.

After dinner the commandant went back to Grenoble.  Benassis’ reiterated assurances that the lad would soon be restored to health had taken a weight off his mind.

Eight months later, in the earliest days of the following December, Genestas was appointed to be lieutenant-colonel of a regiment stationed at Poitiers.  He was just thinking of writing to Benassis to tell him of the journey he was about to take, when a letter came from the doctor.  His friend told him that Adrien was once more in sound health.

“The boy has grown strong and tall,” he said; “and he is wonderfully well.  He has profited by Butifer’s instruction since you saw him last, and is now as good a shot as our smuggler himself.  He has grown brisk and active too; he is a good walker, and rides well; he is not in the least like the lad of sixteen who looked like a boy of twelve eight months ago; any one might think that he was twenty years old.  There is an air of self-reliance and independence about him.  In fact he is a man now, and you must begin to think about his future at once.”

“I shall go over to Benassis to-morrow, of course,” said Genestas to himself, “and I will see what he says before I make up my mind what to do with that fellow,” and with that he went to a farewell dinner given to him by his brother officers.  He would be leaving Grenoble now in a very few days.

As the lieutenant-colonel returned after the dinner, his servant handed him a letter.  It had been brought by a messenger, he said, who had waited a long while for an answer.

Genestas recognized Adrien’s handwriting, although his head was swimming after the toasts that had been drunk in his honor; probably, he thought, the letter merely contained a request to gratify some boyish whim, so he left it unopened on the table.  The next morning, when the fumes of champagne had passed off, he took it up and began to read.