rom that manifested on the last
occasion, Then, it was a sympathetic anger that united them all in a
common feeling against the perpetrator of the deed. Now--even before the
whisper had run round that Peter Mauger had been done to death in the
same way as Tom Hamon--fear was among them, and doubt. Fear of they knew
not exactly what, and doubt of they knew not whom.

But here were two men done to death in their midst, and the man on whom
all their suspicions had settled in the first case could not possibly
have had anything to do with the second, and so had most likely had
nothing to do with either--in which case the man who had was still at
large among them, and no man's life was safe, much less any woman's or
child's.

Their thoughts did not run, perhaps, quite so clearly as that, but that
was the result of it all, and their faces showed it. Furthermore, every
man and woman there began at once to cast about in his and her mind for
the possible murderer, and men looked at the neighbours whom they had
known all their lives, with lurking suspicions in their eyes and the
consideration of strange possibilities in their minds.

Tom Hamon's death had bound them closer together; Peter Mauger's set
them all apart. The strange dead man up in the school-house added to
their discomfort.

It was not until the hastily-constructed litter with its gruesome burden
had been sent off to the Boys' School, in charge of the constables and
the Doctor, that the Senechal caught sight of Nance's eager white face
and anxious eyes, in the crowd that lingered still in answer to another
whisper that had flown round.

If they were at once pig-headed and hot-blooded and suspicious, they
were also warm-hearted and willing to atone for a mistake--once they
were sure of it.

No crowd followed Peter on his last journey but one, though the whole
Island had swarmed after Tom Hamon.

They wanted to see the man who would have been killed for killing Tom,
though he didn't do it, but for--circumstances, and his own pluck and
endurance.

And when the Senechal beckoned to one of the circumstances, and put his
hand on her slim shoulder, and said--

"We are going for him. I thought you would like to come too," her face
went rosy with gratitude, and the brave little hands clasped up on to
her breast, as she murmured--

"Oh, M. le Senechal!" and choked at anything more.

Those nearest gave her rough words of encouragement.

"Cheer up, Nance! You'll s