In the next compartment a party of four were playing dominoes, one of the women who was with them having spread out her apron for a table.
Another party was evidently making up for a meal they had lost, while doing business. The mother took from a basket a part of a big loaf, from which she cut slices and distributed them, with a bit of cheese, to her party, at the same time passing around a jug of cider.
There was an exciting time when one of the chickens escaped from a market-basket and had to be chased all over the carriage. Such a clattering of tongues, flapping of wings, and distressful clucks from the poor fowl, which was at last caught just as she was about to fly out of a window, were never heard before.
The chattering was increased by elaborate good-byes, as one by one the passengers dropped off at the small stations. No one grumbled at having to help sort out the luggage each time, but cheerfully and politely helped disentangle the belongings of the departing ones, and carefully helped to lift the baskets on to the platform, amid profuse thanks, where more friends and relations met them, and there was as much kissing on both cheeks as if they had been on a long journey instead of merely to market.
At one of the stops Germaine noticed a woman, holding a horn and a small red flag, standing by the sliding gates, where the road crossed the railway. She had seen these women before along the line, and her uncle explained that the railway is fenced in on either side by hedges or wire fencing, and wherever a road or street crossed, there are gates, which must be kept closed while trains are passing. Not only must the gatekeeper, who is generally a woman, have the gates tight shut, but she must also stand beside them like a soldier at his post, with her brass horn in one hand and a red flag, rolled up, in the other, showing that she is prepared for any emergency. If she were not there, the engineer of the passing train would report it to headquarters, and she would doubtless be dismissed. The gatekeeper lives in a neat cottage adjoining, and some minutes before each train is due she takes the horn and flag from where they hang on the wall, and is at her post.
At the station were M. and Madame Lafond to welcome them home, and you can imagine how everybody talked at once, and how much there was to tell. The fête at Rouen was the topic of conversation until its glories paled before Petit Andelys' own special fête, which was held some weeks after, and which our little friends, with true French patriotism, thought the finest in the world, not excepting the more elaborate affair at Rouen.