oung girl, so
pale, on the dark moss. A big fly with a blue belly that was walking
along one of the thighs, stopped at the bloodstains, went on again,
always rising higher, ran along the side with his lively, jerky
movements, climbed up one of the breasts, then came back again to
explore the other, looking out for something to drink on this dead girl.
The two men kept watching this wandering black speck.

The doctor said:

"How pretty it is, a fly on the skin! The ladies of the last century
had good reason to paste them on their faces. Why has this fashion gone
out?"

The Mayor seemed not to hear, plunged as he was in deep thought.

But, all of a sudden, he turned round, for he was surprised by a shrill
noise. A woman in a cap and a blue apron rushed up under the trees. It
was the mother, La Roque. As soon as she saw Renardet she began to
shriek:

"My little girl, where's my little girl?" in such a distracted manner
that she did not glance down at the ground. Suddenly, she saw the
corpse, stopped short, clasped her hands, and raised both her arms while
she uttered a sharp, heartrending cry--the cry of a mutilated animal.
Then she rushed towards the body, fell on her knees, and took off, as if
she would have snatched it away, the handkerchief that covered the face.
When she saw that frightful countenance, black and convulsed, she rose
up with a shudder, then pressed her face against the ground, giving vent
to terrible and continuous screams with her mouth close to the thick
moss.

Her tall, thin frame, to which her clothes were clinging tightly, was
palpitating, shaken with convulsions. They could see her bony ankles and
her dried up calves covered with thick blue stockings, shivering
horribly; and she went digging the soil with her crooked fingers as if
in order to make a hole there to hide herself in it.

The doctor moved, said in a low tone:

"Poor old woman!"

Renardet felt a strange rumbling in his stomach; then he gave vent to a
sort of loud sneeze that issued at the same time through his nose and
through his mouth; and, drawing his handkerchief from his pocket, he
began to weep internally, coughing, sobbing, and wiping his face
noisily.

He stammered--

"Damn--damn--damned pig to do this! I would like to see him
guillotined."

But Princepe reappeared, with his hands empty. He murmured--

"I have found nothing, M'sieu le Maire, nothing at all anywhere."

The doctor, scared, replied in a thick vo