istening eyes, and, giving a short bark, crouched at
Bastide's feet. Deeply moved, he laid his hand on the animal's neck,
and motioned the usher, who wanted to remove it, back with a commanding
gesture.

When the court retired for consultation, no one dared speak above a
whisper. A woman sobbed and she was told to be quiet; it was the
Benoit girl, Colard's sweetheart. She had wound her arms about the
poor wretch's shoulders and her tear-stained face expressed but one
desire--to share his fate. A relative of Bastide approached him in
order to speak to him; Bastide shook his head and did not even look at
the man. A sort of drowsiness had settled on his countenance--at
any rate, words no longer carried any weight in his ears. Yet it
happened that he lifted his eyes once more and after coursing through
illimitable space they met those of Clarissa. Now the strange woman did
not strike him as so strange. He heard, again the sound of her voice
when she called him murderer; was it not rather a cry for help than an
accusation? and that beseeching look, as if invisible hands were
clutching at her throat? and that most delicate form so singularly free
from indications of her age, quivering like a young birch in autumn?

Two lonely shipwrecked beings are driven by the currents of the ocean
to the same spot, coming from opposite ends of the earth, unable to
abandon the plank upon which their life depends, unable even to grasp
each other's hands simply driven by the gradually dying wind to unknown
depths. There was something weird in their mutual feeling of
compassion. Yet Bastide's pained and gloomy astonishment gave way to
the dreamy intoxication of fatigue, and the watchful eyes of his dog
appeared to him like two reddish stars between black tree-tops. He
heard the sentence of death when the court returned; he had risen, and
listened to the words of the presiding judge; it sounded like the
splashing of raindrops on withered leaves. He heard himself say
something, but what it was he hardly knew. He saw many faces turned
toward him in the dim light, and they gave him the impression of
worm-eaten and decaying apples.

The verdict concerning the other accused persons was not to be
announced until the following day. The crowds in the hall, in the
entrances, and on the street, dispersed slowly. When Clarissa passed
through the corridor every one stepped timidly aside.

She had learned that Bastide was not to be taken back to Rodez,