h he well enough
recognized the language in which they were uttered. It was English,
but a dialect spoken by the lower orders. He concluded that this was
an English fisherman employed at Calais or Dunkirk.

He spoke to him again, dwelling on his syllables and pointing to the
horizon:

"Calais? Dunkirk?"

The other repeated these two names as well as he could, as though
trying to grasp their meaning. At last his face lit up and he shook
his head.

Then, turning round and pointing in the direction from which he had
come, he twice said:

"Hastings. . . . Hastings. . . ."

Simon started. But the amazing truth did not appear to him at once,
though he was conscious of its approach and was absolutely
dumbfounded. Of course, the fisherman was referring to Hastings as
his birthplace or his usual home. But where had he come from at this
moment?

Simon made a suggestion:

"Boulogne? Wimereux?"

"No, no!" replied the stranger. "Hastings. . . . England. . . ."

And his arm pointed persistently to the same quarter of the horizon,
while he as persistently repeated:

"England. . . . England. . . ."

"What? What's that you're saying?" cried Simon. And he seized the man
violently by the shoulders. "What's that you're saying? That's England
behind you? You've come from England? No, no! You can't mean that.
It's not true!"

The sailor struck the ground with his foot:

"_England!_" he repeated, thus denoting that the ground which he had
stamped upon led to the English mainland.

Simon was flabbergasted. He took out his watch and moved his
forefinger several times round the dial.

"What time did you start? How many hours have you been walking?"

"Three," replied the Englishman, opening his fingers.

"Three hours!" muttered Simon. "We are three hours from the English
coast!"

This time the whole stupendous truth forced itself upon him. At the
same moment he realized what had caused his mistake. As the French
coast ran due north, from the estuary of the Somme, it was inevitable
that, in pursuing a direction parallel to the French coast, he should
end by reaching the English coast at Folkestone or Dover, or, if his
path inclined slightly toward the west, at Hastings.

Now he had not taken this into account. Having had proof on three
occasions that France was on his right and not behind him, he had
walked with his mind dominated by the certainty that France was close
at hand and that her coast might loom out of the f