“This is the place.”
Louis Blanc grunted.
“You’ll be bringing in the police, I suppose?”
Brent did not answer him at once, and Bibi began to fidget. He stood poking his head like an eager dog in the direction of Boves.
“It all depends,” said Brent, “on Madame Latour’s wishes.”
“Hell! Never mind; are you sure this is the road?”
“It’s the first road on the right after Des Ormes. Can you see?”
“Enough. I’m off.”
And he went slouching away into the darkness, leaving Brent standing there, nor did Brent move until he could no longer hear the grinding of Bibi’s boots upon the road.
At Beaucourt, in that room of her simple affection, Manon had sat for a while by the light of the candle, looking at the débris left by those two struggling men. What a sordid affair, what a horror to be forgotten and washed out of the mind! A chair broken, furniture overturned, crockery smashed on the floor,—a patch of blood on the tiles where Bibi had been stretched by the wall. And Philosophe, true to his name, asleep beside the stove, caring nothing for what had happened.