emaciated though she had become, there were always
her bones, and her bones were mighty. The new moon
hung sideways. Great luminous stars shone over the
road and the nearer mountains; while beyond the
sterile and sun-parched waste-land there lay faintly
discerned a fertility so violent, so undisciplined, that
the fecund vines must strain their tendrils almost to
breaking. Anfos sighed and his sigh sounded loud in
the night, for the night seemed well-nigh as still as
his burden. And a little ahead walked Christophe,
alone, his lantern casting a dim, yellow beam, the
spade carried strongly across his left shoulder.
Goundran thought: 'My godson is indeed a
strange boy —no word of regret, no emotion, no
weeping. And yet I do know how he loved the beast
. . . 5 Then he thought: 'She was very shamefully
neglected; I remember thinking that, years ago, when
I saw her in the widow Roustan's shop. I remember
thinking that I would speak . . . Ah, well, when a
man has his work to attend to, when a man possesses
a couple of vessels as I do these days, it has meant
hard work. Belli Santo d'or, she is heavy!'
Anfos thought . . . But Anfos could think of so
little that it hardly seems worth the trouble of record-
ing. The effort of the morning had tired his weak
mind — his mind would often grow tired in the even-
ing and now it was past twelve o'clock at night, so
that what thoughts he had came vaguely to Anfos.
Christophe thought: 'Mireio is sewn up in that
sail —she cannot come limping to find me any
longer. Never again will I stroke her big head, no,
never again as long as I live . . . and I laid my hands
on her poor, big head ... I felt that there was
something strange about them, I think that now
I am afraid of my hands because they were able to
send her to God. But where is she? Am I certain
that she is with God? Jan would not believe that she