back to the priest's house. The delinquent had hoped that the scandal
would soon be forgotten, and that she would revel in peace over the
success of her little plot, but the arrest of the clerk's wife and the
sensation which it caused spoilt the whole thing. If her moral sense
had not been entirely obliterated, her first thought would have been
to get the clerk's wife set at liberty, but she paid little or no
heed to that. She was plunged in a kind of stupor which had nothing
in common with remorse, and what so prostrated her was the evident
failure of her attempt to move the feelings of the priest. Most men
would have been touched by the revelation of so ardent a passion, but
the priest was unmoved. He banished all thought of this remarkable
event from his mind, and when he was fully convinced of the imprisoned
woman's innocence he went to sleep, celebrated mass the next morning,
and recited his breviary just as if nothing had happened.

"That a blunder had been committed in arresting this woman then became
painfully evident, as but for this the matter might have been hushed
up. There had been no actual robbery, but after an innocent woman
had been several days in prison on the charge of theft, it was very
difficult to let the real culprit go unpunished. Her insanity was not
self-evident, and it may even be said that there were no outward signs
of it. Up to that time it had never occurred to anyone that she was
insane, for there was nothing singular in her conduct except her
extreme taciturnity. It was easy, therefore, to question her insanity,
while the true explanation of the act was so incredible and so strange
that her friends could not well bring it forward. The fact of having
allowed the clerk's wife to be arrested was inexcusable. If the taking
of the linen had only been a joke, the perpetrator ought to have
brought it to an end when a third person was made a victim of it. She
was arrested and taken to St. Brieuc for the assizes. Her prostration