THE OLD MAN.
She was alive this morning!… I met her coming out of church…. She told me she was going away; she was going to see her grandmother on the other side of the river where you found her…. She did not know when I should see her again…. She must have been on the point of asking me something; then she dared not and left me abruptly. But I think of it now…. And I saw nothing!… She smiled as they smile who choose to be silent, or who are afraid they will not be understood…. She seemed hardly to hope…. Her eyes were not clear and hardly looked at me….
THE STRANGER.
Some peasants told me they had seen her wandering on the river-bank until nightfall…. They thought she was looking for flowers…. It may be that her death….