“You left him?”
“Only for a minute. He asked me to get him a newspaper from down-stairs, and when I came back the window was open—”
Nathalie rocked as she stood, caught at the wall, and said, with a gasp: “Take the boy to your mother, and don’t frighten her.” Then she ran—how she ran!—though to this hour she thinks her feet were tied together.
In three minutes she had found Jacques in the stable. He thought a ghost was upon him till she spoke.
“Your master is out somewhere, and I think he is going to kill himself. You and I must find him.”
Jacques understood at once. He had known that some calamity was at hand. He snatched up the stable-lantern, went outside, locked the door, and put his question:
“Had he his pistols, madame?”
“No.”
“Then I believe he will have gone to the river.”
“I know it, I know it!” she cried, wildly. “But where!” Jacques muttered to himself, “He would go to the bridge, because it is at its deepest, but there is no use in following him there; one must strike it lower down.” He caught up a long rake which stood against the wall. “Come, madame.” The rain had been swept off by a strong breeze, and the moon made the leaves glisten like diamonds, and flung deep shadows under the trees. The two hurried round in front of the château, and plunged into the heavy wet gloom which brooded round the garden. Nathalie’s cry, “Léon, Léon!” at first timid, rose sharper as they left the house behind them; then she remembered the whistle which she used as a call for her husband, and blew shrilly.