And both of them, helping themselves with feet and knees and hands, torn by the brambles and jagged edges, climb the steep slope to the top.
"There?" breathes Phemie, panting.
"Yes."
And Little Nick, lying flat, hanging over the abyss, extracts from an invisible hole in the rock, where it makes a straight wall to the river, a handful of gold pieces, which he flings, laughing, at his beloved.
There is a frightful scream. Phemie, mad with rage, rises like a fury lusting for vengeance. The gold pieces are pasteboard, ironical gift of the travelling salesman to the "witch," to overcome her last resistance, and heritage of Nicholas, from which, it cannot be denied, the "simpleton" has drawn his profit.
"Beast! Beast!" shouts Phemie, foaming at the mouth.
And as Nicholas tries to rise, she pushes him over the edge. He loses his balance, but clinging to Phemie's skirt, drags her with him.
The river is deep in that spot. Neither of them could swim.
Their bodies were found at the foot of the rock, and the pasteboard gold pieces scattered on the summit, whence their footprints showed that they had fallen.
"A trick of the Devil!" said the peasants.