"Why not? The island of Périac—I call it an island because at high tide the road to it is covered—belongs to the monks of the monastery of Sarzeau, a couple of leagues further on. It seems, indeed, that they're ready to sell the ruins and all the land. But who'd buy them? There's none of it cultivated; it's all wild."
"Is there any other road to it but this?"
"Yes, a stony road which starts at the cliff and runs into the road to Vannes. But I tell you, my dear, it's a lost land—deserted. I don't see ten travelers a year—some shepherds, that's all."
At last at ten o'clock, the caravan was properly installed, and in spite of the entreaties of Saint-Quentin who would have liked to go with her and to whom she intrusted the children, Dorothy, dressed in her prettiest frock and adorned with her most striking fichu, started on her campaign.
The great day had begun—the day of triumph or disappointment, of darkness or light. Whichever it might be, for a girl like Dorothy with her mind always alert and of an ever quivering sensitiveness, the moment was delightful. Her imagination created a fantastic palace, bright with a thousand shining windows, people with good and bad genies, with Prince Charmings and beneficent fairies.
A light breeze blew from the sea and tempered the rays of the sun with its freshness. The further she advanced the more distinctly she saw the jagged contours of the five promontories and of the peninsula in which they were rooted in a mass of bushes and green rocks. The meager outline of a half demolished tower rose above the tops of the trees; and here and there among them one caught sight of the gray stones of a ruin.
But the slope became steeper. The Vannes' road joined hers where it ran down a break in the cliff, and Dorothy saw that the sea, very high up at the moment, almost bathed the foot of this cliff, covering with calm, shallow water the causeway to the peninsula.
On the top were standing, upright, the old gentleman and the lady of whom the widow Amoureux had told her. Dorothy was amazed to recognize Raoul's grandfather and his old flame Juliet Assire. The old Baron! Juliet Assire! How had they been able to get away from the Manor, to escape from Raoul, to make the journey, and reach the threshold of the ruins?
She came right up to them without their even seeming to notice her presence. Their eyes were vague; and they were gazing in dull surprise at this sheet of water which hindered their progress.