"'Shoot, shoot, Ovide!' I screamed, but Ovide, stupefied by terror, stood there groaning and muttering.
"'It is he! It is he! The loup garou! Child of the devil! He will destroy me, body and soul! It is he! It is he! Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!'
"Hearing this, the wolf left Annette and rushed upon us. Then the courage of Ovide returned; he seized the gun and aimed a terrible blow at the head of the beast. But this ferocious animal, evading the blow, in an instant was at my brother's throat. In another minute Ovide would have been in Hell. It was I who saved him; I who came to the rescue with the long knife; I who struck the blow that should have killed the loup garou. By an unlucky chance the blade missed the neck but cut off half of the ear. It drew blood, of course; the beast changed instantly into the human form; and there stood the traitor, Michel Gamache; his face streaming with blood; and there on the snow lay, not the ear of a wolf, but that of a man. Would you like to see it, Jean Baptiste? There it is! I keep it with me all the time, as a souvenir.
"The wedding--did it take place? Certainly not! Annette would have married the sorcerer in spite of all, but her people would not hear of it. Now she is 'Sister Sainte Anne' in the Convent of the Ursulines, where she prays all the time for the soul of the sorcerer. Does she pray also for her dear friend, Celestine Colomb? As to that, you may ask the sorcerer. Go! Ask him, too, why he has lost his ear."
"Good evening, Jean," said Michel Gamache, a little later. "You have been delayed, but no matter. There remains an hour of twilight and there will be a clear moon to-night. You have been talking to that she-devil, Mère Tabeau, I see."
"Mon Dieu! Monsieur Gamache, how do you know that?" said Jean, astonished.
"Oh, my friend, I see many things," said the sorcerer, showing his teeth and uttering a weird laugh. "So you have been making friends with La Colomb. Fine company for a young man. And did she tell you that I was a loup garou, and that she cut off a piece of my ear--hein?"
"Sacré, Monsieur Gamache, that is just what she said. But I did not believe a word of it."
"Oh, believe it if you like, Jean, until I give you another version of the story. But regard my ear. Does it look as though it had been sliced with a knife?"
"No, Monsieur Gamache, not at all. Quite otherwise."