ll" of the Durande, as the people of the Channel
Islands call the figure-head of a ship, was the connecting link between
the vessel and Lethierry's niece. In the Norman Islands the figure-head
of a ship, a roughly-carved wooden statue, is called the Poupee. Hence
the local saying, meaning to sail, "_etre entre poupe et poupee_."

The _poupee_ of the Durande was particularly dear to Mess Lethierry. He
had instructed the carver to make it resemble Deruchette. It looked like
a rude attempt to cut out a face with a hatchet; or like a clumsy log
trying hard to look like a girl.

This unshapely block produced a great effect upon Mess Lethierry's
imagination. He looked upon it with an almost superstitious admiration.
His faith in it was complete. He was able to trace in it an excellent
resemblance to Deruchette. Thus the dogma resembles the truth, and the
idol the deity.

Mess Lethierry had two grand fete days in every week; one was Tuesday,
the other Friday. His first delight consisted in seeing the Durande
weigh anchor; his second in seeing her enter the port again. He leaned
upon his elbows at the window contemplating his work, and was happy.

On Fridays, the presence of Mess Lethierry at his window was a signal.
When people passing the Bravees saw him lighting his pipe, they said,
"Ay! the steamboat is in sight." One kind of smoke was the herald of the
other.

The Durande, when she entered the port, made her cable fast to a huge
iron ring under Mess Lethierry's window, and fixed in the basement of
the house. On those nights Lethierry slept soundly in his hammock, with
a soothing consciousness of the presence of Deruchette asleep in her
room near him, and of the Durande moored opposite.

The moorings of the Durande were close to the great bell of the port. A
little strip of quay passed thence before the door of the Bravees.

The quay, the Bravees and its house, the garden, the alleys bordered
with edges, and the greater part even of the surrounding houses, no
longer exist. The demand for Guernsey granite has invaded these too. The
whole of this part of the town is now occupied by stone-cutters' yards.

XI

MATRIMONIAL PROSPECTS

Deruchette was approaching womanhood, and was still unmarried.

Mess Lethierry in bringing her up to have white hands had also rendered
her somewhat fastidious. A training of that kind has its disadvantages;
but Lethierry was himself still more fastidious. He would have liked to