Could it be that this child, flung into her arms, as it were, from the
shipwreck, born before his time of sorrow, the very offspring of
death,--that had always lived apart from the other lads, with strange,
quiet ways of his own--that had astonished her by his wise sayings as a
child--and that, growing up had brought unnatural prosperity to the
home, as though some higher hand were upon him--could it be that there
was something in him more than of this earth? Her hand trembled so that
it shook the stick on which she leant: she made one or two attempts to
speak, then dropped the two halfpence on the table, as if they burnt
her, and went out.

When Marie was a little better, they sent her away to her married
sister's at Cherbourg, for the doctor said that the only chance of
recovering her balance of mind, lay in removing her from everything that
would remind her of her fright, or of Antoine. News travels slowly in
those parts, especially among the poor and illiterate, and for months
Antoine heard nothing of her, except for an occasional message brought
by some chance traveller from Cherbourg, to the effect that she was
still ill: while his own troubles at home grew and gathered as time went
on. For since that night in the ravine everything seemed to have gone
wrong. A superstitious fear had associated itself with the idea of
Antoine in the minds of the other villagers. The Kaudrens' cottage was
more and more avoided, and the fishing business was injured, for people
chose rather to buy their fish of those of whom no evil things were
hinted. The Pierrés themselves were infected with this feeling, and
Marie's father would go partner with Jean no longer. Jean could not
support a fishing smack by himself, and gave up the distant voyages,
confining himself to the long-shore fishing, and disposing of his
oysters, crayfish and prawns as best he could in the more remote
villages. Meanwhile, old Aimée, getting older and more feeble, would sit