Silvere dropped his gun and bounded on to the tombstone.

“Yes, yes,” he replied, also in a hushed voice.  “Wait, I’ll help you.”

Before he could stretch out his arms, however, a girl’s head appeared above the wall.  With singular agility the damsel had availed herself of the trunk of a mulberry-tree, and climbed aloft like a kitten.  The ease and certainty with which she moved showed that she was familiar with this strange spot.  In another moment she was seated on the coping of the wall.  Then Silvere, taking her in his arms, carried her, though not without a struggle, to the seat.

“Let go,” she laughingly cried; “let go, I can get down alone very well.”  And when she was seated on the stone slab she added: 

“Have you been waiting for me long?  I’ve been running, and am quite out of breath.”

Silvere made no reply.  He seemed in no laughing humour, but gazed sorrowfully into the girl’s face.  “I wanted to see you, Miette,” he said, as he seated himself beside her.  “I should have waited all night for you.  I am going away at daybreak to-morrow morning.”

Miette had just caught sight of the gun lying on the grass, and with a thoughtful air, she murmured:  “Ah! so it’s decided then?  There’s your gun!”

“Yes,” replied Silvere, after a brief pause, his voice still faltering, “it’s my gun.  I thought it best to remove it from the house to-night; to-morrow morning aunt Dide might have seen me take it, and have felt uneasy about it.  I am going to hide it, and shall fetch it just before starting.”

Then, as Miette could not remove her eyes from the weapon which he had so foolishly left on the grass, he jumped up and again hid it among the woodstacks.

“We learnt this morning,” he said, as he resumed his seat, “that the insurgents of La Palud and Saint Martin-de-Vaulx were on the march, and spent last night at Alboise.  We have decided to join them.  Some of the workmen of Plassans have already left the town this afternoon; those who still remain will join their brothers to-morrow.”

He spoke the word brothers with youthful emphasis.

“A contest is becoming inevitable,” he added; “but, at any rate, we have right on our side, and we shall triumph.”

Miette listened to Silvere, her eyes meantime gazing in front of her, without observing anything.

“’Tis well,” she said, when he had finished speaking.  And after a fresh pause she continued:  “You warned me, yet I still hoped. . . .  However, it is decided.”

Neither of them knew what else to say.  The green path in the deserted corner of the wood-yard relapsed into melancholy stillness; only the moon chased the shadows of the piles of timber over the grass.  The two young people on the tombstone remained silent and motionless in the pale light.  Silvere had passed his arm round Miette’s waist, and she was leaning against his shoulder.  They exchanged no kisses, naught but an embrace in which love showed the innocent tenderness of fraternal affection.