feel--but then his mind was in
the most curiously jumbled state! That meeting at the bridge of less
than half an hour ago obsessed him. Where had they come from, these
strangers? How long were they going to stay? Or, perhaps--an
unaccountable dismay suddenly seized him--perhaps they had already
gone! But Papa Fregeau, of course, would know all that--therefore,
naturally, he was impatient to reach the Bas Rhone and Papa Fregeau.

The empty basket on his arm, for Marie-Louise had taken the beacon and
he had forgotten all about Papa Fregeau's fish, Jean paused as he
reached the bridge. It was here that look had passed between them. He
would never forget that. It meant nothing--he was not a fool--it could
mean nothing. It was only a look, only an instant in which those grey
eyes had met his--but he would never forget it!

He hurried on again.

Perhaps he had imagined that expression, that flash, that spark, that
something that was impellingly magnetic in those grey eyes. No, he had
not imagined it; he had felt it, known it, sensed it. In that one
instant something had passed between them that in all his life he would
never forget--it had left him like a man adrift on a shoreless sea with
the startling wonder of it. She was of the _grand monde_--Marie-Louise
had said it. And he was a fisherman. She could have no interest in a
fisherman; and what interest could a fisherman--bah, it was pitifully
laughable! But it was not laughable! If he could only define that
look! It was as if--_bon Dieu_, what was it!--as if she were a woman
and he were a man. Yes; it was that! It was only for a moment, by now
she would have forgotten it; but for that moment it had been that.
Only, whereas she would have forgotten, with him it remained. It was
curious--her form was even more like that dream statue than was
Marie-Louise's. If by any chance she should already have gone! The
thought, recurring, brought once more that twinge of dismay. Was it
strange that he should want to see her again! True, she would never
look at him like that a second time, she had been off her guard for
that little instant when there had been no _grand monde_ and no
fisherman, but she was still the same beautiful woman, glorious in form
and face--and the allurement of her presence was like some rare,
exquisite fragrance stealing upon the senses, enslaving them.

And now, as he approached the little village, and passed the first
cottage, with t