pursued his way to S. Helier. The darkness of the autumn evening was
relieved by the multitudinous illumination of a cloudless sky. The
lanes, bordered by the fortress-like enclosures of the fields, were
shaded overhead by tunnels of interlacing boughs still in the full
thickness of their summer foliage. A bird, disturbed by Elliot's
brushing against the branch on which she roosted, gave a solitary cry of
angry alarm; the dogs barked in the distant farms; the grazing cows,
tethered in the wayside pastures, made soft noises as they cropped the
grass. Passing on by the old grammar school of S. Manelier and then
through the village of Five Oaks, where he scared a quiet family
assembled in their parlour by looking in at their window with a grimace
and a wild scream, he ran on rapidly by the Town Mills and through the
town towards the quay. When he reached the bridge-head the tide was
ebbing; but partly walking, partly wading, he made good his footing on
the Castle-rock. A sleepy sentry challenged, but the page crept through
the darkness without deigning a reply. A ball whizzed through his hat,
but did not check his progress. Availing himself of projections in the
wall with which he seemed well acquainted, he entered his own little
room by the open casement, and throwing himself on the pallet soon slept
the sleep of youth and healthy fatigue.

At Maufant matters were not quite so peaceful. The ladies there, it may
be feared, were ready enough to regret the page's visit and its
consequences, if not to express that regret to the old friend who might
with some cause have complained.

Pretending indifference, he sate silently in a seat further from the
ladies than that which he had occupied before the page's intrusion.
Finding him disinclined for talk, Rose read her husband's letter without
taking any further notice of him by whom it had been brought.