was covered with sweat
and his horse with lather, the lapel of his coat was torn, his breeches
and boots were covered with half-frozen mud.

But having brought his horse to a halt, he swung himself out of the
saddle with the brisk air of a boy who has enjoyed his first ride across
country. Surgeon-Captain Emery was a man well over forty, but to-day his
eyes glowed with that concentrated fire which burns in the heart at
twenty, and he shook de Marmont by the hand with a vigour which made the
younger man wince with the pain of that iron grip.

"My friend, Mr. Clyffurde, an English gentleman," said Victor de Marmont
hastily in response to a quick look of suspicious enquiry which flashed
out from under Emery's bushy eyebrows. "You can talk quite freely,
Emery; and for God's sake tell us your news!"

But Emery could hardly speak. He had been riding hard for the past three
hours, his throat was parched, and through it his voice came up hoarse
and raucous: nevertheless he at once began talking in short, jerky
sentences.

"He landed on Wednesday," he said. "I parted from him on Friday . . . at
Castellane . . . you had my message?"

"This morning early--we came at once."

"I thought we could talk better here--first--but I was spent last
night--I had to sleep at Corps . . . so I sent to you. . . . But now, in
Heaven's name, give me something to drink. . . ."

While he drank eagerly and greedily of the cold spiced wine which
Clyffurde had served out to him, he still scrutinised the Englishman
closely from under his frowning and bushy eyebrows.

Clyffurde's winning glance, however, seemed to have conquered his
mistrust, for presently, after he had put his mug down again, he
stretched out a cordial hand to him.

"Now that our Emperor is back with us," he said as if in apology for his
former suspicions, "we, his friends, are bound to look askance at every
Englishman we meet."

"Of course you are," said Clyffurde with his habitual good-humoured
smile as he grasped Surgeon-Captain Emery's extended hand.

"It is the hand of a friend I am grasping?" insisted Emery.

"Of a personal friend, if you will call him so," replied Clyffurde.
"Politically, I hardly count, you see. I am just a looker-on at the
game."

The surgeon-captain's keen eyes under their bushy brows shot a rapid
glance at the tall, well-knit figure of the Englishman.

"You are not a fighting man?" he queried, much amazed.

"No," replied Clyffurde drily. "