“I do not know, sir,” he said dejectedly, “you will see; my wife is sitting with her.  In spite of all your care, I am very much afraid that death will come to empty my home for me.”

“Do not lose heart, Gasnier.  Death is too busy to take up his abode in any dwelling.”

Benassis went into the house, followed by the father.  Half an hour later he came out again.  The mother was with him this time, and he spoke to her, “You need have no anxiety about her now; follow out my instructions; she is out of danger.”

“If you are growing tired of this sort of thing,” the doctor said to the officer, as he mounted his horse, “I can put you on the way to the town, and you can return.”

“No, I am not tired of it, I give you my word.”

“But you will only see cottages everywhere, and they are all alike; nothing, to outward seeming, is more monotonous than the country.”

“Let us go on,” said the officer.

They rode on in this way for several hours, and after going from one side of the canton to the other, they returned towards evening to the precincts of the town.

“I must just go over there,” the doctor said to Genestas, as he pointed out a place where a cluster of elm-trees grew.  “Those trees may possibly be two hundred years old,” he went on, “and that is where the woman lives, on whose account the lad came to fetch me last night at dinner, with a message that she had turned quite white.”

“Was it anything serious?”

“No,” said Benassis, “an effect of pregnancy.  It is the last month with her, a time at which some women suffer from spasms.  But by way of precaution, I must go in any case to make sure that there are no further alarming symptoms; I shall see her through her confinement myself.  And, moreover, I should like to show you one of our new industries; there is a brick-field here.  It is a good road; shall we gallop?”

“Will your animal keep up with mine?” asked Genestas.  “Heigh!  Neptune!” he called to his horse, and in a moment the officer had been carried far ahead, and was lost to sight in a cloud of dust, but in spite of the paces of his horse he still heard the doctor beside him.  At a word from Benassis his own horse left the commandant so far behind that the latter only came up with him at the gate of the brick-field, where the doctor was quietly fastening the bridle to the gate-post.

“The devil take it!” cried Genestas, after a look at the horse, that was neither sweated nor blown.  “What kind of animal have you there?”

“Ah!” said the doctor, “you took him for a screw!  The history of this fine fellow would take up too much time just now; let it suffice to say that Roustan is a thoroughbred barb from the Atlas mountains, and a Barbary horse is as good as an Arab.  This one of mine will gallop up the mountain roads without turning a hair, and will never miss his footing in a canter along the brink of a