La Vigne appeared, sitting with his hands in his hair.  And the miller’s wife saw there was a strange young demoiselle among the women of the cote, trying to quiet them.  She had a calm dark beauty and an elegance of manner unusual to the provinces, and even Father Robineau beheld her with surprise.

“Mademoiselle, it is unfortunate that you should be in Petit Cap at this time,” said the priest.

“Father, I count myself fortunate,” she answered, “if no worse calamity has befallen me.  My father is safe within here.  Can you tell me anything about my husband, Captain De Mattissart, of the Languedoc regiment, with General Montcalm?”

“Madame, I never saw your husband.”

“He was to meet me with escort at Petit Cap.  We landed on a little point, secretly, with no people at all, and my father would have returned in his sailboat, but my husband did not meet us.  These English must have cut him off, father.”

“These are not times in which a woman should stir abroad,” said the priest.

“Monsieur the cure, there is no such comfortable doctrine for a man with a daughter,” said a figure at the nearest loophole, turning and revealing himself by face and presence a gentilhomme.  “Especially a daughter married to a soldier.  I am Denys of Bonaventure, galloping hither out of Acadia at her word of command.”

The priest made him a gesture of respect and welcome.

“One of the best men in Acadia should be of advantage to us here.  But I regret madame’s exposure.  You were not by yourselves attempting to reach Montcalm’s camp?”

“How do I know, monsieur the cure?  My daughter commanded this expedition.”  Denys of Bonaventure shrugged his shoulders and spread his palms with a smile.

“We were going to knock at the door of the cure of Petit Cap,” said the lady.  “There was nothing else for us to do; but the English appeared.”

Successive shots at the loopholes proved that the English had not yet disappeared.  Denys seized his gun again, and turned to the defense, urging that the children and women be sent out of the way of balls.

Father Robineau, on his part, gave instant command to the miller’s wife, and she climbed the stairs again, heading a long line of distressed neighbors.

The burrs were in the second story, and here the roaring of the mill took possession of all the shuddering air.  Every massive joist half growing from dimness overhead was hung with ghostly shreds of cobweb; and on the grayish whiteness of the floor the children’s naked soles cut out oblongs dotted with toe-marks.

Mother Sandeau made her way first to an inclosed corner, and looked around to invite the attention of her followers.  Such violence had been done to her stolid habits that she seemed to need the sight of her milk-room to restore her to intelligent action.  The group was left in half darkness while she thrust her candle into the milk-room, showing its orderly array of flowered bowls amidst moist coolness.  Here was a promise of sustenance to people dependent for the next mouthful of food.  “It will last a few days, even if the cows be driven off and killed!” said the miller’s good wife.