And—oh, mon Dieu! mon Dieu! yes—there, in the bows, lay the body of a man!—and the tears she had kept back all day broke out now in a fury of weeping. She could hardly see, but she ran on, falling at times and bruising herself, staggering to her feet again, stumbling blindly through a mist of tears.
The boat was drawn up by the time she got there, and a curious crowd surrounded it. She pushed through. She must see.
And then the weight fell off her heart, and it was all she could do to keep from screaming. For this poor thing, whatever it was, was not Stephen Gard and never had been.
She wanted to sing and dance and scream her joy aloud. They had not found him.
"What is this, John Drillot?" asked Julie, alongside her, black with anger, as she pointed to the body.
"Ma fé—a ghost, they say. John Trevna shot him, but he had been dead a long time before that, though he was alive last night, for Peter had hold of his leg as he ran."
"And where is the other—the one you went for?"
"He's not on L'Etat, anyway, ma fille," and they lifted the body on to a piece of sailcloth, and carried it off through the tunnel for the Sénéchal to look into.
So Stephen Gard's hiding-place had proved effective, and they had not found him. But, of a certainty, he must be starving, and so away home sped Nance, to prepare a parcel of food to take across to him. And Julie, her black brows pinched together and her face set in a frown of venomous intention, never once let her out of her sight.
It was after midnight when Nance stole across the fields, carrying her little parcel and her swimming-bladders, and made her way to Brenière point.