Three months never appear to us to contain half of their real length when we have much to consider and much to do in a given time of that duration. One month had already elapsed, during whose flight Guy had made some important discoveries.
He had traced up the bogus parsonage, and had even found, by some lucky accident, the residence of Philip Campbell, the rescuer of Fifine de Maistre. The "Lower Farms" is, of all secluded spots, about the most secluded, and people went there just as Guy did—through curiosity. It tempted Guy in his search as being the most direct route from the house where the extraordinary wedding had taken place. He had been sitting in the small public room of the village inn a few hours after his arrival, hiding his anxious face behind the folds of the country weekly newspaper, when the conversation of a group of men at the counter in the corner interested him.
"Take somethin', doctor," said one burly, good-natured fellow to an aged person of apparent dignity and respectability, "you must feel all out o' sorts after this day's work."
"Not a bit," said the man addressed, "we doctors grow quite accustomed to such sights when we have reached my age in the profession."
"I dare say, indeed, doctor," said a credulous looking youth, who was rubbing his unshaved chin and lips with the broad back of a sunburnt hand, "ye must have interestin' sights now and then doctor, though wan 'ud think there wudd'nt be much fuss in a place like this, barrin' it comes from folks' own contrariness, like Michael Doyle's daughter to-day—the world knows if they'd stuck to the old style, like their dacenter neighbors, and burnt their safe tallow candles, Maggie Doyle wuddn't be shrivelled up to a crisp to-night from coal ile 'splosions. We all told 'em so!"—wound up this matter-of-fact youth, after reviewing in a few words the sad fate of one of the village girls, who had, the night previous, met her death through a lamp explosion that had set fire to her clothes.
"'Tis sad to see a young woman the victim of death," the doctor said reflectively. "I get quite overcome myself when I see them suffer. I have never forgotten the pitiful sight of the young woman we picked up in the bush leading from the 'Grey House' one morning about three years ago."
This familiar allusion of the old doctor's to his experience of that eventful day was as well understood by every one there as it was by himself, but somehow such persons of eminence as doctors or curates of small villages always find the rustic inhabitants ready to appreciate their tales, were it their hundredth repetition. Fortunately for Guy, some rough sycophant expressed himself interested in the allusion, and asked a question or two, which succeeded in bringing out for about the sixtieth time from the doctor's lips the whole story of Josephine de Maistre's rescue. Guy strained his ears as he leaned sideways to hear the interesting details. He could scarcely conceal his agitation as each precious item dropped from the aged doctor's lips. Finally, Guy laid down his paper and approached the listening group.
"I have overheard your strange story," he said, addressing the venerable man of medicine, "and being of your profession myself, I naturally interest myself in your experience. Did your unfortunate patient die?" he tried to ask in the most careless curiosity.
The village doctor looked condescendingly on the intruder, and the others in dumb courtesy moved aside to let the new comer through.
"No, she did not die," the doctor answered, rubbing his hands, "but though she recovered her bodily health, her mind was terribly deranged. None of us could glean anything of importance from her wild answers, she was foolishly inconsistent in everything, but when she spoke of her 'revenge' and of 'Bijou,' whoever that was."