k like a regular! Now when I get before the gentlemen in
black, I don't want to contradict them, and so I always say, 'Yes, my
lord,' and they are perfectly satisfied; sometimes they laugh and the
president of the court says, 'Stand up, Bouzille,' and then he gives me
a fortnight, or twenty-one days, or a month, as the case may be."

* * * * *

The sergeant came back, alone, and addressed the gendarme.

"The other man has been discharged," he said. "As for Bouzille, M. de
Presles does not think there is any need to interrogate him."

"Am I to be punted out then?" enquired the tramp with some dismay, as he
looked uneasily towards the window, against the glass of which rain was
lashing.

The sergeant could not restrain a smile.

"Well, no, Bouzille," he said kindly, "we must take you to the lock-up;
there's the little matter of the rabbit to be cleared up, you know. Come
now, quick march! Take him to Saint-Jaury, Morand!"

The sergeant went back to the library to hold himself at the
magistrate's disposal; through the torrential downpour of rain Bouzille
and the gendarme wended their way to the village; and left alone in her
kitchen, Louise put out her lamp, for despite the shocking weather it
was getting lighter now, and communed with herself.

"I've a kind of idea that they would have done better to keep that other
man. He was a villainous-looking fellow!"

The sad, depressing day had passed without any notable incident.

Charles Rambert and his father had spent the afternoon with Therese and
the Baronne de Vibray continuously addressing large black-edged
envelopes to the relations and friends of the Marquise de Langrune,
whose funeral had been fixed for the next day but one.

A hasty dinner had been served at which the Baronne de Vibray was
present. Her grief was distressing to witness. Somewhat futile to
outward seeming, this woman had a very kind and tender heart; as a
matter of course she had constituted herself the protector and comforter
of Therese, and she had spent the whole of the previous day with the
child at Brives, ransacking the local shops to procure her mourning.

Therese was terribly shocked by the dreadful death of her grandmother
whom she adored, but she displayed unexpected strength of character and
controlled her grief so that she might be able to look after the guests
whom she was now entertaining for the first time as mistress of the
house. The Baronne de