could learn was that the girl and the child had gone in the direction of
Fourche. He hurried to Fourche: the widow and her lovers had not
returned, nor had Père Léonard. The servant told him that a young girl
and a child had come there and inquired for him, but that she, not
knowing them, thought it best not to admit them and advised them to go
to Mers.

"Why did you refuse to let them in?" said Germain angrily. "Are you so
suspicious in these parts that you don't open your door to your
neighbor?"

"Oh! bless me!" the servant replied, "in a rich house like this, one
has to keep a sharp lookout. I am responsible for everything when the
masters are away, and I can't open the door to everybody that comes."

"That's a vile custom," said Germain, "and I'd rather be poor than live
in fear like that. Adieu, girl! adieu to your wretched country!"

He inquired at the neighboring houses. Everybody had seen the
shepherdess and the child. As the little one had left Belair
unexpectedly, without being dressed for the occasion, with a torn blouse
and his little lamb's fleece over his shoulders; and as little Marie was
necessarily very shabbily dressed at all times, they had been taken for
beggars. Some one had offered them bread; the girl had accepted a piece
for the child, who was hungry, then she had walked away very fast with
him and had gone into the woods.

Germain reflected a moment, then asked if the farmer from Ormeaux had
not come to Fourche.