ouse too. Look,
that little gray speck, not far from the great poplar at Godard, just
below the church-spire."

"Ah! I see it," said the girl; and thereupon she began to weep again.

"I did wrong to remind you of that," said Germain, "I keep doing foolish
things to-day! Come, Marie, my girl, let's be off; the days are short,
and when the moon comes up, an hour from now, it won't be warm."

They resumed their journey, and rode across the great heath, and as
Germain did not urge the mare, in order not to fatigue the girl and the
child by a too rapid gait, the sun had set when they left the road to
enter the woods.

Germain knew the road as far as Magnier; but he thought that he could
shorten it by not taking the avenue of Chanteloube, but going by Presles
and La Sepulture, a route which he was not in the habit of taking when
he went to the fair. He went astray and lost a little more time before
entering the woods; even then he did not enter at the right place, and
failed to discover his mistake, so that he turned his back to Fourche
and headed much farther up, in the direction of Ardentes.

He was prevented then from taking his bearings by a mist which came with
the darkness, one of those autumn evening mists which the white
moonlight makes more vague and more deceptive. The great pools of water
which abound in the clearings exhaled such dense vapor that when Grise
passed through them, they only knew it by the splashing of her feet and
the difficulty she had in pulling them out of the mud.

When they finally found a straight, level path, and had ridden to the
end of it, Germain, upon endeavoring to ascertain where he was, realized
that he was lost; for Pere Maurice, in describing the road, had told him
that, on leaving the woods, he would have to descend a very steep hill,
cross a very large meadow, and ford the river twice. He had advised him
to be cautious about riding into the river, because there had been heavy
rains at the beginning of the season, and the water might be a little
high. Seeing no steep hill, no meadow, no river, but the level moor,
white as a sheet of snow, Germain drew rein, looked about for a house,
waited for some one to pass, but saw nothing to give him any
information. Thereupon he retraced his steps, and rode back into the
woods. But the mist grew denser, the moon was altogether hidden, the
roads were very bad, the ruts deep. Twice Grise nearly fell; laden as
she was, she lost courage, and