ty
of police and gendarmes was watching the country a little farther south,
towards the Etang des Morts. He therefore left his horse in a shed, took
to the fields and woods, and intercepted Cesar d'Ombre on his way to the
rendezvous. Explanations were not altogether easy, for Cesar cared
little for the private affairs of young La Mariniere. He had never
expected much from the son of Urbain. He took his warning, and gave up
his companionship easily enough. Striking off across country, avoiding
all roads likely to be patrolled by the police, he made his way alone to
Brittany and the coast, while Angelot returned by the way he had come.

For the sake of taking the very shortest cut across the _landes_, he
brought his horse up to La Joubardiere and left him there. For no horse
could carry him through the lanes, rocky as they were, at the pace that
he could run and walk across country, and it was only because Uncle
Joseph insisted on it that he had taken a horse at all.

The golden light of sunrise spread over the moor as he ran. He took long
leaps through the heather, and coveys of birds scuttled out of his way;
but their lives were safe that morning, though his eyes followed them
eagerly. Far beyond the purple _landes_, the woods of Lancilly lay
heaped against the western sky, a billowy dark green sea of velvet
touched with the bright gold of autumn and of sunrise; and the chateau
itself shone out broad in its glittering whiteness. The guests were all
gone now; the music was still; and for Angelot the place was empty, a
mere shell, a pile of stones. Other roofs covered the joy of his life
now.

This shortest cut from La Joubardiere did not bring him to Les
Chouettes by the usual road, but by a sharp slope of moorland, all
stones and bushes and no path at all, and then across one or two small
fields into a narrow lane, a bridle-path between high straggling hedges,
one way from Les Chouettes to La Mariniere. The poplars by the manor
gate, a shining row, lifted their tall heads, always softly rustling, a
quarter of a mile farther on.

Angelot ran across the fields, jumped a ditch, reached the lane at a
sharp corner, and was turning to the right towards Les Chouettes,
thinking in his joyful gladness that he would be back before even Helene
expected him, when something struck his ear and brought him to a sudden
stand. It was a woman's scream.

"Help, help!" a voice cried; and then again there was a piteous shriek
of pain