This was the ambush.
"What are you doing here?" called out the vivandière.
The woman raised her head, and the former added angrily—
"Are you insane to remain there!"
She went on—
"A little more, and you would have been blown to atoms!" Then addressing the soldiers, she said, "It's a woman."
"Pardieu! That's plain to be seen," replied a grenadier.
The vivandière continued—"To come into the woods to get oneself massacred. Can you conceive of any one so stupid as that?"
The woman, surprised, bewildered, and stunned, was gazing around, as though in a dream, at these muskets, sabres, bayonets, and savage faces. The two children awoke and began to cry.
"I am hungry," said one.
"I am afraid," said the other.
The baby went on nursing.
The vivandière addressed it.
"You are the wise one," she said.
The mother was dumb with terror.
"Don't be afraid," exclaimed the sergeant, "we are the battalion of the Bonnet Rouge."
The woman trembled from head to foot. She looked at the sergeant, of whose rough face she could see only the eyebrows, moustache, and eyes like two coals of fire.
"The battalion formerly known as the Red-Cross," added the vivandière.
The sergeant continued—
"Who are you, madam?"
The woman looked at him in terror. She was thin, young, pale, and in tatters. She wore the large hood and woollen cloak of the Breton peasants, fastened by a string around her neck. She left her bosom exposed with the indifference of an animal. Her feet, without shoes or stockings, were bleeding.
"It's a beggar," said the sergeant.
The vivandière continued in her martial yet womanly voice—a gentle voice withal—
"What is your name?"
The woman stammered in a scarce audible whisper:
"Michelle Fléchard."
Meanwhile the vivandière stroked the little head of the nursing baby with her large hand.
"How old is this midget?" she asked.
The mother did not understand. The vivandière repeated—"I ask you how old it is?"
"Oh, eighteen months," said the mother.
"That's quite old," said the vivandière; "it ought not to nurse any longer, you must wean it. We will give him soup."
The mother began to feel more at ease. The two little ones, who had awakened, were rather interested than frightened; they admired the plumes of the soldiers.
"Ah, they are very hungry!" said the mother.
And she added—
"I have no more milk."
"We will give them food," cried the sergeant, "and you also. But there is something more to be settled. What are your political opinions?"
The woman looked at him and made no reply.
"Do you understand my question?"
She stammered—
"I was put into a convent when I was quite young, but I married; I am not a nun. The Sisters taught me to speak French. The village was set on fire. We escaped in such haste that I had no time to put my shoes on."
"I ask you what are your political opinions?"
"I don't know anything about that."
The sergeant continued—
"There are female spies. That kind of person we shoot. Come, speak. You are not a gypsy, are you? What is your native land?"
She still looked at him as though unable to comprehend.
The sergeant repeated—
"What is your native land?"
"I do not know," she said.
"How is that? You do not know your country?"
"Ah! Do you mean my country? I know that."
"Well, what is your country?"
The woman replied—
"It is the farm of Siscoignard, in the parish of Azé."
It was the sergeant's turn to be surprised. He paused for a moment, lost in thought; then he went on—
"What was it you said?"
"Siscoignard."
"You cannot call that your native land."
"That is my country."
Then after a minute's consideration she added—
"I understand you, sir. You are from France, but I am from Brittany."
"Well?"
"It is not the same country."
"But it is the same native land," exclaimed the sergeant.
The woman only replied—
"I am from Siscoignard."
"Let it be. Siscoignard, then," said the sergeant. "Your family belong there, I suppose?"
"Yes!"
"What is their business?"
"They are all dead. I have no one left."
The sergeant, who was quite loquacious, continued to question her.
"Devil take it, every one has relations, or one has had them! Who are you? Speak!"
The woman listened bewildered; this "or one has had them" sounded more like the cry of a wild beast than the speech of a human being.
The vivandière felt obliged to interfere. She began to caress the nursing child, and patted the other two on the cheeks.
"What is the baby's name? It's a little girl, isn't it?"
The mother replied, "Georgette."
"And the oldest one? For he is a man, the rogue!"
"René-Jean."
"And the younger one? For he is a man too, and a chubby one into the bargain."
"Gros-Alain," replied the mother.
"They are pretty children," said the vivandière. "They look already as if they were somebody."
Meanwhile the sergeant persisted.
"Come! Speak, madam! Have you a house?"
"I had one once."
"Where was it?"
"At Azé."
"Why are you not at home?"
"Because my house was burned."
"Who burned it?"
"I do not know. There was a battle."
"Were do you come from?"
"From over there."
"Where are you going?"
"I do not know."
"Come, to