Shuddering, uncertain how to act next, Véronique listened till she no longer heard the sound of his footsteps. What should she do? The murder of Stéphane had for a moment turned her thoughts from François; but she now once more fell a prey¹ to anguish². What had become of her son? Should she go to him at the Priory and defend him against the dangers that threatened him?  
"Come, come," she said, "I'm losing my head . . . . Let me think things out . . . . A few hours ago, François was speaking to me through the wall of his prison . . . for it was certainly he then, it was certainly François who yesterday took my hand and covered it with his kisses . . . . A mother cannot be deceived; and I was quivering with love and tenderness . . . . But since . . . since this morning has he not left his prison?"
 
She stopped to think and then said, slowly:
 
"That's it . . . that's what happened . . . . Stéphane and I were discovered below, on the floor underneath³. The alarm was given at once. The monster, Vorski's son, had gone up expressly to watch François. He found the cell empty and, seeing the opening which had been made, crawled out here. Yes, that's it . . . . If not, by what way did he come? . . . When he got here, it occurred to him to run to the window, knowing that it overlooked the sea and suspecting that François had chosen it to make his escape. He at once saw the hooks of the ladder. Then, on leaning over, he saw me, knew who I was and called out to me . . . . And now . . . now he is on his way to the Priory, where he is bound to meet François . . . ."
 
Nevertheless Véronique did not stir. She had an instinct that the danger lay not at the Priory but here, by the cells. And she wondered whether François had really succeeded in escaping and whether, before his task was done, he had not been surprised by the other and attacked by him.
 
It was a horrible doubt! She stooped quickly and, perceiving that the hole had been widened, tried to pass through it herself. But the outlet⁴, at most large enough for a child, was too narrow for her; and her shoulders became fixed⁵. She persisted in the attempt, however, tearing her bodice and bruising⁶ her skin against the rock, and at last, by dint⁷ of patience and wriggling⁸, succeeded in slipping through.
 
The cell was empty. But the door was open on the passages facing her; and Véronique had an impression—merely an impression, for the window admitted only a faint light—that some one was just leaving the cell through the open door. And from this confused impression of something that she had not absolutely seen she retained the certainty that it was a woman who was hiding there, in the passage, a woman surprised by her unexpected entrance.
 
"It's their accomplice," thought Véronique. "She came up with the boy who killed Stéphane, and she has no doubt taken François away . . . . Perhaps François is even there still, quite near me, while she's watching me . . . ."
 
Meanwhile Véronique's eyes were growing accustomed to the semidarkness and she distinctly saw a woman's hand upon the door, which opened inwardly. The hand was slowly pulling.
 
"Why doesn't she shut it at once," Véronique wondered, "since she obviously wants to put a barrier between us?"
 
Véronique received her answer when she heard a pebble¹⁰ grating under the door and interfering¹¹ with its movement. If the pebble were not there, the door would be closed. Without hesitating, Véronique went up, took hold of a great iron handle and pulled it towards her. The hand disappeared, but the opposition¹² continued. There was evidently a handle on the other side as well.
 
Suddenly she heard a whistle. The woman was summoning assistance. And almost at the same time, in the passage, at some distance from the woman, there was a cry:
 
"Mother! Mother!"
 
Ah, with what deep emotion Véronique heard that cry! Her son, her real son was calling to her, her son, still a captive but alive! Oh, the superhuman delight of it!
 
"I'm here, darling!"
 
"Quick, mother! I'm tied up; and the whistle is their signal . . . they'll be coming."
 
"I'm here . . . . I shall save you before they come!"
 
She had no doubt of the result. It seemed to her as though her strength knew no limits and as though nothing could resist the exasperated¹³ tension of her whole being.
 
Her adversary¹⁴ was in fact weakening and giving ground by inches. The opening became wider; and suddenly the contest was over. Véronique walked through.
 
The woman had already fled down the passage and was dragging the boy by a rope in order to make him walk despite the cords with which he was bound. It was a vain attempt and she abandoned it forthwith. Véronique was close to her, with her revolver in her hand.
 
The woman let go the boy and stood up in the light from the open cells. She was dressed in white serge, with a knotted girdle round her waist. Her arms were half bare. Her face was still young, but faded, thin and wrinkled. Her hair was fair, interspersed¹⁵ with strands¹⁶ of white. Her eyes gleamed with a feverish¹⁷ hatred¹⁸.
 
The two women looked at each other without a word, like two adversaries¹⁹ who have met before and are about to fight again. Véronique almost smiled, with a smile of mingled²⁰ triumph and defiance²¹. In the end she said:
 
"If you dare to lay a finger on my child, I'll kill you. Go! Be off!"
 
The woman was not frightened. She seemed to be reflecting and to be listening in the expectation of assistance. None come. Then she lowered her eyes to François and made a movement as though to seize upon her prey again.
 
"Don't touch him!" Véronique exclaimed, violently. "Don't touch him, or I fire!"
 
The woman shrugged²² her shoulders and said, in measured accents:
 
"No threats, please! If I had wanted to kill that child of yours, I should have done so by now. But his hour has not come; and it is not by my hand that he is to die."
 
Véronique, trembling all over, could not help asking:
 
"By whose hand is he to die?"
 
"By my son's: you know . . . the one you've seen."
 
"Is he your son, the murderer, the monster?"
 
"He's the son of . . ."
 
"Silence! Silence!" Véronique commanded. She understood that the woman had been Vorski's mistress and feared that she would make some disclosure in François' presence. "Silence: that name is not to be spoken."
 
"It will be when it has to be," said the woman. "Ah, I've suffered enough through you, Véronique: it's your turn now; and you're only at the beginning of it!"
 
"Go!" cried Véronique, pointing her revolver.
 
"Once more, no threats, please."
 
"Go, or I fire! I swear it on the head of my son."
 
The woman retreated, betraying a certain anxiety in spite of herself. But she was seized with a fresh access of rage. Impotently she raised her clenched²⁴ fists and shouted, in a raucous²⁵, broken voice:
 
"I will be revenged . . . You shall see. Véronique . . . . The cross—do you understand?—the cross is ready . . . . You are the fourth . . . . What, oh, what a revenge!"
 
She shook her gnarled, bony fists. And she continued:
 
"Oh, how I hate you! Fifteen years of hatred! But the cross will avenge²⁶ me . . . . I shall string you up on it myself . . . . The cross is ready . . . you'll see . . . the cross is ready for you! . . ."
 
She walked away slowly, holding herself erect²⁷ under the threat of the revolver.
 
"Don't kill her, mother, will you?" whispered François, suspecting the contest in his mother's mind.
 
Véronique seemed to wake from a dream:
 
"No, no," she replied, "don't be afraid . . . . And yet perhaps I ought to . . ."
 
"Oh, please let her be, mother, and let us go away."
 
She lifted him in her arms, even before the woman was out of sight, pressed him to her and carried him to the cell as though he weighed no more than a little child.
 
"Mother, mother," he said.
 
"Yes, darling, your own mother; and no one shall take you from me again, that I swear to you."
 
Without troubling about the wounds inflicted²⁸ by the stone she slipped, this time almost at the first attempt, through the gap made by François, drew him after her and then, but not before, released him from his bonds.
 
"There is no danger here," she said, "at least for the moment, because they can hardly get at us except by the cell and I shall be able to defend the entrance."
 
Mother and son exchanged the fondest of embraces. There was now no barrier to part their[Pg 187] lips and their arms. They could see each other, could gaze into each other's eyes.
 
"How handsome you are, my darling!" said Véronique.
 
She saw no resemblance between him and the boy murderer and was astonished that Honorine could have taken one for the other. And she felt as if she would never weary of admiring the breeding, the frankness and the sweetness which she read in his face.
 
"And you, mother," he said, "do you think that I ever pictured a mother as beautiful as you? No, not even in my dreams, when you seemed as lovely as a fairy. And yet Stéphane often used to tell me . . ."
 
She interrupted him:
 
"We must hurry, dearest, and take refuge from their pursuit. We must go."
 
"Yes," he said, "and above all we must leave Sarek. I have invented a plan of escape which is bound to succeed. But, first of all, Stéphane: what has become of him? I heard the sound of which I spoke²³ to you underneath my cell and I fear . . ."
 
She dragged him along by the hand, without answering his question:
 
"I have many things to tell you, darling, painful things which I must no longer keep from you. But presently will do . . . . For the moment we must take refuge in the Priory. That woman will go in search of help and come after us."
 
"But she was not alone, mother, when she entered my cell suddenly and caught me in the act of digging at the wall. There was some one with her."
 
"A boy, wasn't it? A boy of your own size?"
 
"I could hardly see. He and the woman fell upon me, bound me and carried me into the passage. Then the woman left me for a moment and he went back to the cell. He therefore knows about this tunnel by now and about the exit in the Priory grounds."
 
"Yes, I know. But we shall easily get the better of him; and we'll block up the exit."
 
"But there remains²⁹ the bridge which joins the two islands," François objected.
 
"No," she said, "I burnt it down and the Priory is absolutely cut off."
 
They were walking very quickly, Véronique pressing her pace, François a little anxious at the words spoken by his mother.
 
"Yes, yes," he said, "I see that there is a good deal which I don't know and which you have kept from me, mother, in order not to frighten me. For instance, when you burnt down the bridge . . . . It was with the petrol set aside for the purpose, wasn't it, and as arranged with Maguennoc in case of danger? So you were threatened too; and the first attack was made on you, mother? . . . And then there was something that woman said with such a hateful look on her face! . . . And then . . . and then, above all, what has become of Stéphane? They were whispering about him just now in my cell . . . . All this worries me . . . . Then again I don't see the ladder which you brought . . . ."
 
"Please, dearest, don't let us wait a moment. The woman will have found assistance . . . ."
 
The boy stopped short:
"Mother."
 
"What? Do you hear anything?"
 
"Some one walking."
 
"Are you sure?"
 
"Some one coming this way."
 
"Oh," she said, in a hollow voice, "it's the murderer coming back from the Priory!"
 
She felt her revolver and prepared herself for anything that might happen. But suddenly she pushed François towards a dark corner on her left, formed by the entry to one of those tunnels, probably blocked, which she had noticed when she came.
 
"Get in there," she said. "We shall be all right here: he will not see us."
 
The sound approached.
 
"Stand well back," she said, "and don't stir."
 
The boy whispered:
 
"What's that in your hand? A revolver? Mother, you're not going to fire?"
 
"I ought to, I ought to," said Véronique. "He's such a monster! . . . It's as with his mother . . . I ought to have . . . we shall perhaps regret it." And she added, almost unconsciously, "He killed your grandfather."
 
"Oh, mother, mother!"
 
She supported him, to prevent his falling, and amid the silence she heard the boy sobbing³⁰ on her breast and stammering³¹:
 
"Never mind . . . don't fire, mother . . . ."
 
"Here he comes, darling, here he comes; look at him."
 
The other passed. He was walking slowly, a little bent³², listening for the least sound. He appeared to Véronique to be the exact same size as her son; and this time, when she looked at him with more attention, she was not so much surprised that Honorine and M. d'Hergemont had been taken in, for there were really some points of resemblance, which would have been accentuated³³ by the fact that he was wearing the red cap stolen from François.
 
He walked on.
 
"Do you know him?" asked Véronique.
 
"No, mother."
 
"Are you sure that you never saw him?"
 
"Sure."
 
"And it was he who fell upon you, with the woman, in your cell?"
 
"I haven't a doubt of it, mother. He even hit me in the face, for no reason, with absolute hatred."
 
"Oh," she said, "this is all incomprehensible! When shall we escape this awful nightmare?"
 
"Quick, mother, the road's clear. Let's make the most of it."
 
On returning to the light, she saw that he was very pale and felt his hand in hers like a lump of ice. Nevertheless he looked up at her with a smile of happiness.
 
They set out again; and soon, after passing the strip of cliff that joined the two islands and climbing the staircases, they emerged in the open air, to the right of Maguennoc's garden. The daylight was beginning to wane³⁴.
 
"We are saved," said Véronique.
 
"Yes," replied the boy, "but only on condition that they cannot reach us by the same road. We shall have to bar it, therefore."
 
"How?"
 
"Wait for m............