“There was no sight of Bompard,” said he, “he has not come back, then?”
“Bompard will not come back,” replied the girl, “we will never see him again.”
Then she told of the death traps beyond the rocks and of the match.
La Touche listened, standing, and still holding the ribband of seaweed in his fingers.
She could see that he believed what she said and yet his words gave the lie to what was in his face.
“Oh, Bompard will come back all right,” said he. “He’s not such a fool as to get into any of those bogs; he’s sulking, that’s all.”
He shaded his eyes, looking back towards the rocks as though on the chance of seeing the missing one; then he sat down before his plate and helped himself to food and the girl, loathing him and the food as well, sat down and made a pretence of eating.
She noticed that he was cheerful, for a wonder. He ate with good appetite and shewed in his movements and manner and voice when he spoke a restrained vivacity new to him.
His blondness, the washed-out blue of his eyes, his features, his voice, she considered all these anew as she sat opposite to him. It seemed to her that anything truly manly about him had come from the sea; that essentially he was a product of Mont Martre or the Banlieu of old Paris. She loathed him now as only a woman can loathe a man and, woman-like, her loathing focussed itself upon his blondness and the colour of his eyes.
Then, when she had done with the pretence of eating she rose up and, leaving him to remove the things, walked down to the water’s edge and along towards the break in the cliffs.