nstantaneous; the sinking vital forces rallied
desperately. The old man's eyes opened again, wandered round the room,
then fixed themselves intently on Francois as he stood near the fire.
Trying and terrible as his position was at that moment, Gabriel still
retained self-possession enough to whisper a few words in Perrine's ear.
"Go back again into the bedroom, and take the children with you," he
said. "We may have something to speak about which you had better not
hear."

"Son Gabriel, your grandfather is trembling all over," said Francois.
"If he is dying at all, he is dying of cold; help me to lift him, bed
and all, to the hearth."

"No, no! don't let him touch me!" gasped the old man. "Don't let him
look at me in that way! Don't let him come near me, Gabriel! Is it his
ghost? or is it himself?"

As Gabriel answered he heard a knocking at the door. His father opened
it, and disclosed to view some people from the neighboring fishing
village, who had come--more out of curiosity than sympathy--to inquire
whether Francois and the boy Pierre had survived the night. Without
asking any one to enter, the fisherman surlily and shortly answered the
various questions addressed to him, standing in his own doorway. While
he was thus engaged, Gabriel heard his grandfather muttering vacantly to
himself, "Last night--how about last night, grandson? What was I talking
about last night? Did I say your father was drowned? Very foolish to say
he was drowned, and then see him come back alive again! But it wasn't
that--I'm so weak in my head, I can't remember. What was it, Gabriel?
Something too horrible to speak of? Is that what you're whispering and
trembling about? I said nothing horrible. A crime! Bloodshed! I know
nothing of any crime or bloodshed here--I must have been frightened out
of my wits to talk in that way! The Merchant's Table? Only a big heap
of old stones! What with the storm, and thinking I was going to die,
and being afraid about your father, I must have been light-headed. Don't
give another thought to that nonsense, Gabriel! I'm better now. We shall
all live to laugh at poor grandfather for talking nonsense about
crime and bloodshed in his sleep. Ah, poor old man--last
night--light-headed--fancies and nonsense of an old man--why don't you
laugh at it? I'm laughing--so light-headed, so light--"

He stopped suddenly. A low cry, partly of terror and partly of pain,
escaped him; the look of pining anxiety and imbecile c