It was fortunate that he took the precaution to move noiselessly, as if he were stalking game, for he had hardly reached the edge of the wood when he saw Simon standing in the moonlight. Evidently he had been sitting or lying on the bank and had just risen to his feet, for one of his comrades lay there still.
"He is hidden here. He must be here," said Simon, in a low, decided voice. "I will not go away without him. Hungry and thirsty—yes, I dare say you are. You deserve it, for letting him escape."
"I tell you, he is not here," said the other man. "We have been all round this bit of country; all through it. And look at the moonlight. A mouse couldn't get away without our seeing it. What's that? a rabbit?"
"I shall walk round again," said Simon. "Those other fellows may be asleep, if they are as drowsy and discontented as you. Look sharp now, while I am away."
Simon tramped down the lane. The other police officer stretched himself and stared after him.
"I'll eat my cap," he muttered, "if the young gentleman's in the wood still. He deserves to be caught, if he is."
At that moment Angelot was standing under an oak two yards away. In the broad, deep shadow he was invisible. A longing seized him to knock the man's cap off his head and tell him to keep his word and eat it. But Simon was too near, and it was madness to risk the chase that must follow. Angelot laughed to himself as he slipped from that shadow to the next, the officer yawning desperately the while.
There was something unearthly about Les Chouettes in the moonlight. It seemed to float like a fairy dwelling, with its slim tower and high windows, on a snowy ocean of sand. The woods, dark guarding phalanxes of tall oaks and firs, seemed marshalled on the slopes for its defence. Angelot came down upon it by the old steep lane, having slipped across from the ruined farm to a vineyard, along by a tall hedge into another wood of low scrub and bracken, then into the road a hundred yards above the house. Before he reached it he heard the horses kicking in the stable, then a low bark from the nearest dog which he answered by softly whistling a familiar tune.
In consequence of this all the dogs about the place came running to meet him, softly patting over the sand, and it was on this group, standing under her window in the midnight stillness, that Riette looked out a few minutes later.
Something woke her, she did not know what, but this little watcher's sleep was always of the lightest, and she had not long fallen asleep, her eyelashes still wet with tears for Angelot. The window creaked as she opened it, leaning out into the moonlight.