* * * * *
The night was nearly spent; Ma'ame Pélagie had glided from the bench
upon which she had rested, and for hours lay prone upon the stone
flagging, motionless. When she dragged herself to her feet it was to
walk like one in a dream. About the great, solemn pillars, one after
the other, she reached her arms, and pressed her cheek and her lips
upon the senseless brick.
"Adieu, adieu!" whispered Ma'ame Pélagie.
There was no longer the moon to guide her steps across the familiar
pathway to the cabin. The brightest light in the sky was Venus, that
swung low in the east. The bats had ceased to beat their wings about
the ruin. Even the mocking-bird that had warbled for hours in the old
mulberry-tree had sung himself asleep. That darkest hour before the
day was mantling the earth. Ma'ame Pélagie hurried through the wet,
clinging grass, beating aside the heavy moss that swept across her
face, walking on toward the cabin--toward Pauline. Not once did she
look back upon the ruin that brooded like a huge monster--a black spot
in the darkness that enveloped it.