Michel looked round and saw Henri d'Estreville. His face flushed and then paled. He sat down on the nearest seat to gather breath and strength. Michel had almost despaired of his friend since the terrible day at Vilna, when the remnant of Ney's division, tattered and war-worn, had marched into the town like men returning from the grave; when he had looked and inquired for Henri among the rest and found him not. Even when he had heard it said, this very morning, that the Baron had reappeared, he had scarcely dared to believe it. For five minutes he sat still, not daring to move or speak. At last he rose from his seat, and advancing from behind came up and touched the Baron's shoulder.
"So you, too, have reached home in safety, _mon ami_!" he said. "You have returned from the grave indeed! Do you not know that we mourned you for dead? Allow me to share your table? I am a little shy of these super-aristocratic persons in times of peace; in the field the devil may care how many airs they put on; but here it is different. My commission feels new and strange to me; I am afraid at every moment that some one will say 'What right have you here? go out!'" Michel talked quickly, to conceal his agitation. Henri looked up and gave Michel his hand, smiling.
"Yes, I found my way home somehow," he said; "yet for all the joy I feel in living I wish to God I had stayed beneath the Russian snows."
"Why--what mean you--what has happened?" he asked.
"Michel, _mon ami_, you have been a good friend to me; you will sympathise; it will do me good to tell you; listen. Have I your permission to bore you with my tale of woe?"
"Yes--speak--who knows, I may be able to counsel you, give you relief----"
"No, it is impossible. Listen, my friend. You may remember our first meeting, when I lay wounded at Smolensk, I spoke confidentially--you will call it raving, I daresay--the subject, women; I confessed many things foolish and wicked; I spoke of one pure sentiment; of the love, strange and unfamiliar, because pure and disinterested, that I cherished for a very simple, very charming maiden whose name----"
"Was Mathilde--was it not?--or Louise; one of the daughters of a _maître d'armes_."
"Yes; Louise; you professed to know her--to have heard of her, at any rate. Well, let that pass then. It is strange, my friend, but my affection in that quarter has not vanished after the fashion of the wretched sentiment I have hitherto felt for other women, which has evaporated when the object is absent. On the contrary, it has increased in absence. I returned home to Paris inclined, certainly, to love the girl even more than I loved her at parting; a wonderful thing for me, Michel, _mon brave_, and very remarkable." Henri smiled ruefully at his friend.