Both of them put their horses to a gallop.

“The other soldier that I spoke of,” Benassis went on, “is another of those men of iron who have knocked about everywhere with our armies.  His life, like that of all French soldiers, has been made up of bullets, sabre strokes, and victories; he has had a very rough time of it, and has only worn the woolen epaulettes.  He has a fanatical affection for Napoleon, who conferred the Cross upon him on the field of Valontina.  He is of a jovial turn of mind, and like a genuine Dauphinois, has always looked after his own interests, has his pension, and the honors of the Legion.  Goguelat is his name.  He was an infantry man, who exchanged into the Guard in 1812.  He is Gondrin’s better half, so to speak, for the two have taken up house together.  They both lodge with a peddler’s widow, and make over their money to her.  She is a kind soul, who boards them and looks after them, and their clothes as if they were her children.

“In his quality of local postman, Goguelat carries all the news of the countryside, and a good deal of practice acquired in this way has made him an orator in great request at up-sittings, and the champion teller of stories in the district.  Gondrin looks upon him as a very knowing fellow, and something of a wit; and whenever Goguelat talks about Napoleon, his comrade seems to understand what he is saying from the movement of his lips.  There will be an up-sitting (as they call it) in one of my barns to-night.  If these two come over to it, and we can manage to see without being seen, I shall treat you to a view of the spectacle.  But here we are, close to the ditch, and I do not see my friend the pontooner.”

The doctor and the commandant looked everywhere about them; Gondrin’s soldier’s coat lay there beside a heap of black mud, and his wheelbarrow, spade, and pickaxe were visible, but there was no sign of the man himself along the various pebbly watercourses, for the wayward mountain streams had hollowed out channels that were almost overgrown with low bushes.

“He cannot be so very far away.  Gondrin!  Where are you?” shouted Benassis.

Genestas first saw the curling smoke from a tobacco pipe rise among the brushwood on a bank of rubbish not far away.  He pointed it out to the doctor, who shouted again.  The old pontooner raised his head at this, recognized the mayor, and came towards them down a little pathway.

“Well, old friend,” said Benassis, making a sort of speaking-trumpet with his hand.  “Here is a comrade of yours, who was out in Egypt, come to see you.”

Gondrin raised is face at once and gave Genestas a swift, keen, and searching look, one of those glances by which old soldiers are wont at once to take the measure of any impending danger.  He saw the red ribbon that the commandant wore, and made a silent and respectful military salute.

“If the Little Corporal were alive,” the officer cried, “you would have the Cross of the Legion of Honor and a handsome pension besides, for every man who wore epaulettes on the other side of the river owed his life to you on the 1st of October 1812.  But I am not the Minister of War, my friend,” the commandant added as he dismounted, and with a sudden rush of feeling he grasped the laborer’s hand.