"Honorine is dead."
"Dead!"
The two sisters both cried out at once. Then they were silent and looked at each other. The same thought struck them both. They seemed to be reflecting. Gertrude was moving her fingers as though counting. And the terror on their two faces increased.
Speaking in a very low voice, as though choking with fear, Gertrude, with her eyes fixed on Véronique, said:
"That's it . . . that's it . . . I've got the total . . . . Do you know how many there were in the boats, without my sisters and me? Do you know? Twenty . . . . Well, reckon it up: twenty . . . and Maguennoc, who was the first to die . . . and M. Antoine, who died afterwards . . . and little François and M. Stéphane, who vanished, but who are dead too . . . and Honorine and Marie Le Goff, both dead . . . . So reckon it up: that makes twenty-six, twenty-six . . . The total's correct, isn't it? . . . Now take twenty-six from thirty . . . . You understand, don't you? The thirty coffins: they have to be filled . . . . So twenty-six from thirty . . . leaves four, doesn't it?"
She could no longer speak; her tongue faltered. Nevertheless the terrible syllables came from her mouth; and Véronique heard her stammering:
"Eh? Do you understand? . . . That leaves four . . . us four . . . the three sisters Archignat, who were kept behind and locked up . . . and yourself . . . . So—do you follow me?—the three crosses—you know, the 'four women crucified'—the number's there . . . it's our four selves . . . there's no one besides us on the island . . . four women . . . ."
Véronique had listened in silence. She broke out into a slight perspiration.
She shrugged her shoulders, however:
"Well? And then? If there's no one except ourselves on the island, what are you afraid of?"