ed. There was plenty
of water, and the moon was shining; so that he was able to enter the
port.

The little harbour was silent. A few vessels were moored there, with
their sails brailed up to the yards, their tops over, and without
lanterns. At the far end a few others were visible, high and dry in the
careenage, where they were undergoing repairs; large hulls dismasted and
stripped, with their planking open at various parts, lifting high the
ends of their timbers, and looking like huge dead beetles lying on their
backs with their legs in the air.

As soon as he had cleared the harbour mouth, Gilliatt examined the port
and the quay. There was no light to be seen either at the Bravees or
elsewhere. The place was deserted, save, perhaps, by some one going to
or returning from the parsonage-house; nor was it possible to be sure
even of this; for the night blurred every outline, and the moonlight
always gives to objects a vague appearance. The distance added to the
indistinctness. The parsonage-house at that period was situated on the
other side of the harbour, where there stands at the present day an open
mast-house.

Gilliatt had approached the Bravees quietly, and had made the sloop fast
to the ring of the Durande, under Mess Lethierry's window.

He leaped over the bulwarks, and was ashore.

Leaving the sloop behind him by the quay, he turned the angle of the
house, passed along a little narrow street, then along another, did not
even notice the pathway which branched off leading to the Bu de la Rue,
and in a few minutes found himself at that corner of the wall where
there were wild mallows with pink flowers in June, with holly, ivy, and
nettles. Many a time concealed behind the bushes, seated on a stone, in
the summer days, he had watched here through long hours, even for whole
months, often tempted to climb the wall, over which he contemplated the
garden of the Bravees and the two windows of a little room seen through
the branches of the trees. The stone was there still; the bushes, the
low wall, the angle, as quiet and dark as ever. Like an animal returning
to its hole, gliding rather than walking, he made his way in. Once
seated there, he made no movement. He looked around; saw again the
garden, the pathways, the beds of flowers, the house, the two windows of
the chamber. The moonlight fell upon this dream. He felt it horrible to
be compelled to breathe, and did what he could to prevent it.

He seemed to be ga