knew it would not be occupied by the
watch. She did not fear that she would be disturbed, yet she dared not
take possession of the place until it was quite dark. She sat down by a
ditch and waited, thankful that she had found what she wanted. Then at
last, when it was quite dark and all was quiet, she picked her way
carefully over the beds of artichokes and slipped into the hut. It was
better inside than she had hoped, for the ground was covered with straw
and there was a wooden box that would serve her for a pillow.

Ever since she had run from the baker's shop it had seemed to her that
she was like a tracked animal, and more than once she had looked behind
her with fear, half expecting to see the police on her heels.

She felt now in the hut that she was safe. Her nerves relaxed. After a
few minutes she realized that she had another cause for anxiety. She was
hungry, very hungry. While she was tramping along the roads, overwhelmed
by her great loss, it had seemed to her that she would never want to eat
or drink again. She felt the pangs of hunger now and she had only one
sou left. How could she live on one sou for five or six days? This was a
very serious question. But then, had she not found shelter for the
night; perhaps she would find food for the morrow.

She closed her eyes, her long black lashes heavy with tears. The last
thing at night she had always thought of her dead father; now it was the
spirits of both her father and her mother that seemed to hover around
her. Again and again she stretched out her arms in the darkness to them,
and then, worn out with fatigue, with a sob she dropped off to sleep.

But although she was tired out, her slumbers were broken. She turned and
tossed on the straw. Every now and again the rumbling of a cart on the
road would wake her, and sometimes some mysterious noise, which in the
silence of the night made her heart beat quickly. Then it seemed to her
that she heard a cart stop near the hut on the road. She raised herself
on her elbow to listen.

She had not made a mistake; she heard some whispering. She sprang to her
feet and looked through the cracks of the hut. A cart had stopped at the
end of the field, and by the pale light from the stars she could dimly
see the form of a man or woman throwing out baskets to two others, who
carried them into the field. This was Monneau's lot. What did it mean at
such an hour? Had Monneau come so late to cut his artichokes?

Then she u