The big man picked the small man up in his arms and slipped within the garden, Diane softly locking and barring the iron door behind him, and, running around to the back of the house, lifted the lid of a cellar door, showing some narrow stone steps that led down into the black cave of the cellars. As she did this, she recognized Jean in the big man, and François in the small man he was carrying, and Jean recognized her.
François’ soul was not in this world at that moment, although it was shortly to return to his body.
Jean and Diane wasted no time in polite inquiries after each other’s health.
“Can you carry his legs?” asked Jean in a whisper.
“Yes,” replied Diane, slipping down the stairs and taking hold of François’ legs, for she could step backward, knowing the stairs well.
The next minute they found themselves in the cellars. There were two small rooms. The windows were tightly closed so that no gleam of light should betray that the place was inhabited. A handful of charcoal burned in a little brazier, for the spring night was sharp and the cellar was cold, and one solitary candle in the outer room merely revealed the gulf of darkness. Huddled over the brazier was the figure of old Marie, the cook; in all cataclysms of one’s life, some one is found who is faithful.
There was something like comfort in the place. A carpet was spread upon the stone floor, and a couple of pallets in the inner room accommodated the mistress and the maid. On one of these they laid François, breathing heavily. Jean stripped off François’ shoes, and Diane, producing a pair of scissors, cut away the clothing from his leg below the knee. A horrid wound was spurting blood. Marie ran and fetched some water from a barrel in the corner, and Diane unceremoniously, in the presence of Jean, divested herself of her white cambric petticoat, a thing of filmy ruffles and lace, and tore it into strips to bind up François’ wounds. Again, with her deft scissors she cut away a part of his coat and shirt. Old Marie washed the wound in his shoulder, and Jean, with his rude surgery, bound it up with a part of Diane’s petticoat. When this was over, François opened his eyes, and looking about him whispered in a weak voice, and with a weak grin: