“Hungry, madame,” said the man softly. “A thousand thanks.” He hid the coin about him furtively, and saluted Lady Onslow again. The lifted cap revealed a narrow head shaved almost to the skin. Upon the temples was a livid scar, new-healed and ugly.
“You are a stranger to Guernsey?” Fenella hazarded.
“A stranger, madame. I came from Cherbourg yesterday. A fisherman brought me in his boat. I am not particular as to my accommodation, as madame will guess, nor was the boatman extortionate. Yet he took all my money, and left me without enough to buy a meal.”
“You have friends in the island?”
“No and yes,” the man returned. “The little daughter of one who was an old comrade of mine lives here in charge of a woman who was her foster-mother, and has married a foreman of the stone works. Madame has seen her playing with the children of the good carrier. She did not know who looked at her and questioned of her name just now. When last I saw her (five years ago), she was but four years old. At four years old the little Lucille could not be expected to understand—madame is cold?”
Fenella shrunk and shivered at the sound of that hated name. She recovered herself in another instant. She looked at the forlorn creature, who tried to interest her in his little story, with compassionate gentleness.
“Can the father not come himself to see his child?” she asked. “Is he an invalid or——?”
The man answered her shortly and harshly.
“The father is in prison.”
He laughed a grating laugh, and ground the heel of his broken boot upon the pavement.