Two dogs, abandoned by the
flight of their masters, leaped and sniffed around him, coaxing him
for protection. They were unable to get the desired scent in that land
trodden down and disfigured by the transit of thousands of men. A
family cat was watching the birds that were beginning to return to their
haunts. With timid flutterings they were picking at what the horses had
left, and an ownerless hen was disputing the banquet with the winged
band, until then hidden in the trees and roofs. The silence intensified
the rustling of the leaves, the hum of the insects, the summer
respiration of the sunburnt soil which appeared to have contracted
timorously under the weight of the men in arms.
Desnoyers was losing exact track of the passing of time. He was
beginning to believe that all which had gone before must have been a bad
dream. The calm surrounding him made what had been happening here seem
most improbable.
Suddenly he saw something moving at the far end of the road, at the very
highest point where the white ribbon of the highway touched the blue of
the horizon. There were two men on horseback, two little tin soldiers
who appeared to have escaped from a box of toys. He had brought with
him a pair of field glasses that had often surprised marauders on his
property, and by their aid he saw more clearly the two riders clad in
greenish gray! They were carrying lances and wearing helmets ending in a
horizontal plate .
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