joined his comrade.

"Lime-burner," he said, sitting down on the bag of meal, and mechanically
twisting tight the loose, leaking corner, "the devil's in that leper."

"He was a good enough fellow once," answered Garotte, watching Pomfrette.

"I drank with him at five o'clock yesterday," said Duclosse
philosophically. "He was fit for any company then; now he's fit for
none."

Garotte looked wise. "Mealman," said he, "it takes years to make folks
love you; you can make them hate you in an hour. La! La! it's easier
to hate than to love. Come along, m'sieu' dusty-belly."

Pomfrette's life in Pontiac went on as it began that day. Not once a
day, and sometimes not once in twenty days, did any human being speak to
him. The village baker would not sell him bread; his groceries he had to
buy from the neighbouring parishes, for the grocer's flighty wife called
for the constable when he entered the bake-shop of Pontiac. He had to
bake his own bread, and do his own cooking, washing, cleaning, and
gardening. His hair grew long and his clothes became shabbier. At last,
when he needed a new suit--so torn had his others become at woodchopping
and many kinds of work--he went to the village tailor, and was promptly
told that nothing but Luc Pomfrette's grave-clothes would be cut and made
in that house.

When he walked down to the Four Corners the street emptied at once, and
the lonely man with the tinkling bell of honour at his knee felt the
whole world falling away from sight and touch and sound of him. Once