meagre that even her husband's chief sign of affection was to pull her
great toe, passing her bed of a morning to light the fire.

Carterette Mattingley also came, but another friend who had watched over
Guida for years before Philip appeared in the Place du Vier Prison never
entered her doorway now. Only once or twice since that day on the
Ecrehos, so fateful to them both, had Guida seen Ranulph. He had
withdrawn to St. Aubin's Bay, where his trade of ship-building was
carried on, and having fitted up a small cottage, lived a secluded life
with his father there. Neither of them appeared often in St. Heliers,
and they were seldom or never seen in the Vier Marchi.

Carterette saw Ranulph little oftener than did Guida, but she knew what
he was doing, being anxious to know, and every one's business being every
one else's business in Jersey. In the same way Ranulph knew of Guida.
What Carterette was doing Ranulph was not concerned to know, and so knew
little; and Guida knew and thought little of how Ranulph fared: which was
part of the selfishness of love.

But one day Carterette received a letter from France which excited her
greatly, and sent her off hot-foot to Guida. In the same hour Ranulph
heard a piece of hateful gossip which made him fell to the ground the man
who told him, and sent him with white face, and sick, yet indignant
heart, to the cottage in the Place du Vier Prison.




CHAPTER XXV