erceived Father Rielle enter the barn, lantern in
hand, and with thin, high-nosed, sour countenance depicting intense
surprise, eagerly explore the place for Pauline. Ringfield held his
breath, but had enough sense to lie down again in the straw, and feign
slumber; happily the priest did not concern himself with the loft, but
the absence of the bird he had expected to find, caged and waiting,
seemed to mystify him. He remained for several minutes lost in
thought, then setting the lantern on one box, moved others around,
strewed them with a thick layer of hay he found on the floor, and lying
down with his cloak pulled well over him, settled to a night's rest.
Ringfield, thus imprisoned, passed for his part a miserable night; he
dared not move and his excited brain kept him from sleeping. Towards
four o'clock the lantern flickered out; at six, while it was yet dark,
the priest arose and went his way, and an hour later Ringfield also
retraced his steps to the village. Like a man in an exceedingly
unpleasant, but most distinct dream, he found himself bound in a net of
intrigue from which there seemed no chance of escape. It was Sunday
morning and at eleven he would have to take charge of the service and
address the usual congregation as Father Rielle had already partly
done, the early mass at St. Jean Baptiste-on-the-Hill being held at
half past seven.

The road between the grim leafless trees was now swept clean of both
snow and hail by the streams of heavy rain which had poured the
previous night, and the air was mild. Much havoc had been wrought in
places by the furious storm; the rocky ground was littered with
branches and twigs of all sizes; rivers of yellow mud ran where the
clay road should be, and against this desolation there glowed
occasional plants of bright green, low along the ground, that had
escaped the winter's rages of a high level. Crows were silhouetted
against the pale blue sky laced with streamers of white, and spring
seemed to be in the air rather than late autumn; the excited birds
called to each other as they flew high over the forest, as if to hail
this pleasant morning, a contrast to the stormy night. Suddenly the
sun shone through those cloudy gossamers and irradiated the bright
green ferns and orange lichens, drawing the eye to the cross of gold
that topped Father Rielle's fine church. Ringfield went out of his way
to look at the fall; it was much swollen from the rain and thundered
ove