dark man made off, nobody knows where, and his comrade, coming up to Véret, said to him in a strangled sort of voice,— 

 "Where are you going, Denis Véret?" 

 The shoemaker began to be uneasy; and knowing that you must not speak to the things of darkness, especially near an evil tree, he continued his way without looking round; but he was followed by the being he took to be a spirit, who walked behind, keeping step with him. 

 When they reached the end of the open ground the pursuer turned to the left, saying, "Good-night, Denis Véret!" 

 And then for the first time Véret recognized Joseph, and laughed at his own fears; but still without being able to imagine for what purpose and in whose company Joseph had come to the big elm between one and two o'clock in the morning. 

 When this last affair came to my knowledge I felt very sorry, and reproached myself for not trying to turn Joseph from the evil ways he seemed to be taking. But I had let so much time elapse I did not like to take the matter up then. I spoke to Brulette, who only made fun of it; from which I began to believe they had a secret love for each other of which I had been the dupe, like other folks who tried to see magic in it and only saw fire. 

 I was more grieved than angry. Joseph, so slack at his work and so cranky, seemed to me a weak stay and a poor companion for Brulette. I could have told her that (putting myself entirely out of the question) she could have played a better game with her cards; but I was afraid to say it, thinking I might make her angry, and so lose her friendship, which seemed to me very sweet, even without her other favors. 

 One night, coming home, I found Joseph sitting on the edge of the fountain which is called the Font de Fond. My house, then known by the name of "God's crossing," because it was built where two roads, since altered, crossed each other, looked out upon that fine greensward which you saw not long ago sold and cut up as waste land,—a great misfortune for the poor, who used it as a common to feed their beasts, but hadn't enough money to buy it. It was a wide bit of pasture-land, very green, and watered here and there by the brook, which was not kept within bounds but ran as it pleased through the grass, cropped short by the flocks, and always pleasing to the eye as it stretched away in the distance. 

 I contented myself with bidding Joseph good-evening; but he rose and walked beside me, as if 

 Prev. P 30/265 next