sieur Evanturel."

The Seigneur's face became sterner still. "What business had he to know
that she received a letter that day?"

"He is postmaster," innocently replied the Notary. "He is the
devil!" said the Seigneur tartly. "I beg your pardon, Cure; but it is
Evanturel's business not to know what letters go to and fro in that
office. He should be blind and dumb, so far as we all are concerned."

"Remember that Evanturel is a cripple," the Cure answered gently. "I am
glad, very glad it was not Rosalie."

"Rosalie has more than usual sense for her sex," gruffly but kindly
answered the Seigneur, a look of friendliness in his eyes. "I shall talk
to her about her father; I can't trust myself to speak to the man."

"Rosalie is down there with Madame Dauphin," said the Notary, pointing.
"Shall I ask her to come?"

The Seigneur nodded. He was magistrate and magnate, and he was the
guarantor of the post-office, and of Rosalie and her father. His eyes
fixed in reverie on Rosalie; he and the Cure passively waited her
approach.

She came over, pale and a little anxious, but with a courageous look.
She had a vague sense of trouble, and she feared it might be the little
cross, that haunting thing of all these months.

When she came near, the Cure greeted her courteously, and then, taking
the Notary by the arm, led him away.

The Seigneur and Rosalie being left alone, the girl said: "You wish to
speak with me, Monsieur?"

The Seigneur scrutinised her sharply. Though her colour came and went,
her look was frank and fearless. She had had many dark hours since that
fateful month of April. At night, trying to sleep, she had heard the
ghostly footsteps in the church, which had sent her flying homeward.
Then, there was the hood. She had waited on and on, fearing word would
come that it had been found in the churchyard, and that she had been
seen putting the cross back upon the church door. As day after day
passed she had come at length to realise that, whatever had happened to
the hood, she was not suspected. Yet the whole train of circumstances
had a supernatural air, for the Cure and Jo Portugais had not made
public their experience on the eventful night; she had been educated in
a land of legend and superstition, and a deep impression had been made
upon her mind, giving to her other new emotions a touch of pathos, of
imagination, and adding character to her face. The old Seigneur stroked
his chin as he looked at her. He rea