ey.
Finally Jean unburdened his mind to his friend and talked with him
of Ellenor's infatuation for Dominic. Would it be that she had
drowned herself to be rid of the torture of her life?

Perrin was haunted perpetually by this idea: it was with him by day
and by night. He went about like a man who was half asleep, and
people began to complain that he did not even nod to his
acquaintances when he met them. So the Christmas season passed and
it was the last day of the Old Year. The cold and the snow
disappeared, and the weather was mild and calm as Perrin rowed
homewards about four o'clock in the afternoon. He had been to pull
up his lobster pots which had been put down not far from Lihou
island. Buried in thought, he did not notice how close he was rowing
to the reef of rocks off the north of the island, till a loud cry
startled him and he saw that someone was signalling to him from a
jutting rock close to his boat. It was a woman. It was Ellenor
Cartier.

Mad with joy, Perrin brought his boat into a tiny creek, moored it
and scrambled up the rocks to the girl's side.

"Don't come near me!" she cried, "for the sake of your mother! I am
minding Blaisette. She is ill, dreadfully, dreadfully ill. If she
gets well, the doctor says it will be a miracle. But even _he_ is
afraid to come much. Since Christmas Eve he hasn't been here. It was
then I came, just after his visit."

She had gradually edged away from Perrin, and now placed herself
behind a boulder. Over its edge her pale face looked sadly at her
lover.

"Do you know," she went on, "perhaps you won't believe me, but till
I saw you just now in your boat, I didn't even feel sorry I left you
on Christmas Eve. Are you very angry with me?"

"I couldn't be angry with you, my darling! Even now, it seems I
can't believe you're alive. We found your white roses, all wet and
spoilt, in a hedge close to Rocquaine Bay; and, ah, how we feared,
your father and me ... But, Ellenor, tell me, how is it you came
here? And how was it you were on the rocks just when my boat
passed."

"I was on the rocks to try to see if I could let one of you men know
we want food, and to tell the doctor he _must_ come again. I've
given her all the medicine he left. It would be no use for me to go
over to Rocquaine at low tide, because not a soul would help me; all
would run away from me."

"Set your heart at rest, my Ellenor. I'll go for all you want. But,
quick, tell me, how is it you came h