“Well, M. le Comte,” said Remy, “what do you think of those fires?”

“Those fires, which seem to you to announce a hospitable shelter, appear to me to be full of danger.”

“And why so?”

“Remy,” said Henri, lowering his voice, “look at these corpses; they are all French—­there is not one Fleming; they announce to us a great disaster.  The dykes have been broken to finish the destruction of the French army, if it has been conquered—­to nullify the victory, if they have been victors.  Those fires are as likely to have been lighted by enemies as by friends, and may be simply a ruse to draw fugitives to destruction.”

“Nevertheless, we cannot stay here; my mistress will die of cold and hunger.”

“You are right, Remy; remain here with madame, and I will go to the jetty, and return to you with news.”

“No, monsieur,” said Diana, “you shall not expose yourself alone; we have been saved together; we will live or die together.  Remy, your arm.  I am ready.”

Each word which she pronounced had so irresistible an accent of authority that no one thought of disputing it.  Henri bowed, and walked first.

It was more calm; the jetty formed, with the hill, a kind of bay, where the water slept.  All three got into the little boat, which was once more launched among the wrecks and floating bodies.  A quarter of an hour after, they touched the jetty.  They tied the chain of the boat to a tree, landed once more, walked along the jetty for nearly an hour, and then arrived at a number of Flemish huts, among which, in a place planted with lime trees, were two or three hundred soldiers sitting round a fire, above whom floated the French flag.  Suddenly a sentinel, placed about one hundred feet from the bivouac, cried, “Qui vive?”

“France,” replied Du Bouchage.  Then, turning to Diana, he said, “Now, madame, you are saved.  I recognize the standard of the gendarmes of Aunis, a corps in which I have many friends.”

At the cry of the sentinel and the answer of the comte several gendarmes ran to meet the new comers, doubly welcome, in the midst of this terrible disaster, as survivors and compatriots.  Henri was soon recognized; he was eagerly questioned, and recounted the miraculous manner in which he and his companions had escaped death.  Remy and Diana had sat down silently in a corner; but Henri fetched them and made them come to the fire, for both were still dripping with water.

“Madame,” said he, “you will be respected here as in your own house.  I have taken the liberty of calling you one of my relations.”

And without waiting for the thanks of those whose lives he had saved, he went away to rejoin the officers.

The gendarmes of Aunis, of whom our fugitives were claiming hospitality, had retired in good order after the defeat and the sauve qui peut of the chiefs.  Whereever there is similarity of position and sentiment, and the habit of living together, it is common to find unanimity in execution as well as in thought.  It had been so that night with the gendarmes of Aunis; for seeing their chiefs abandon them, they agreed together to draw their ranks closer, instead of breaking them.  They therefore put their horses to the gallop, and, under the conduct of one of the ensigns, whom they loved for his bravery and respected for his birth, they took the road to Brussels.