Rose raised the coat which Riviere, in spite of Dard, had flung over his foot.

“He is bleeding!  Dard is bleeding!  Oh, my poor Dard.  Oh! oh!”

“Hush, Rose!”

“No, don’t put him out of heart, mademoiselle.  Take another pull at the flask, Dard.  If you please, ladies, I must have him home without delay.”

“Oh yes, but I want him to have a surgeon,” cried Josephine.  “And we have no horses nor people to send off as we used to have.”

“But you have me, mademoiselle,” said Edouard tenderly.  “Me, who would go to the world’s end for you.”  He said this to Josephine, but his eye sought Rose.  “I’m a famous runner,” he added, a little bumptiously; “I’ll be at the town in half an hour, and send a surgeon up full gallop.”

“You have a good heart,” said Rose simply.

He bowed his blushing, delighted face, and wheeled Dard to his cottage hard by with almost more than mortal vigor.  How softly, how nobly, that frolicsome girl could speak!  Those sweet words rang in his ears and ran warm round and round his heart, as he straightened his arms and his back to the work.  When they had gone about a hundred yards, a single snivel went off in the wheelbarrow.  Five minutes after, Dard was at home in charge of his grandmother, his shoe off, his foot in a wet linen cloth; and Edouard, his coat tied round the neck, squared his shoulders, and ran the two short leagues out.  He ran them in forty minutes, found the surgeon at home, told the case, pooh-poohed that worthy’s promise to go to the patient presently, darted into his stable, saddled the horse, brought him round, saw the surgeon into the saddle, started him, dined at the restaurateur’s, strolled back, and was in time to get a good look at the chateau of Beaurepaire just as the sun set on it.

Jacintha came into Dard’s cottage that evening.

“So you have been at it, my man,” cried she cheerfully and rather roughly, then sat down and rocked herself, with her apron over her head.  She explained this anomalous proceeding to his grandmother privately.  “I thought I would keep his heart up anyway, but you see I was not fit.”

Next morning, as Riviere sat writing, he received an unexpected visit from Jacintha.  She came in with her finger to her lips, and said, “You prowl about Dard’s cottage.  They are sure to go and see him every day, and him wounded in their service.”

“Oh, you good girl! you dear girl!” cried Edouard.

She did not reply in words, but, after going to the door, returned and gave him a great kiss without ceremony.  “Dare say you know what that’s for,” said she, and went off with a clear conscience and reddish cheeks.

Dard’s grandmother had a little house, a little land, a little money, and a little cow.  She could just maintain Dard and herself, and her resources enabled Dard to do so many little odd jobs for love, yet keep his main organ tolerably filled.