“You are right,” said the farmer.  “Let’s go on—­but, if we don’t find her at the end of the path, I give it up—­for I must take the Ardentes road.”

“Oho!” thought the ploughman, “I won’t leave you! even if I should have to twist around the Devil’s Pool with you for twenty-four hours!”

“Stay!” said Germain suddenly, fixing his eyes on a clump of furze which was moving back and forth in a peculiar way:  “hola! hola!  Petit-Pierre, my child, is that you?”

The child, recognizing his father’s voice, leaped out of the bushes like a kid, but when he saw that he was with the farmer, he stopped as if in terror, and stood still, uncertain what to do.

“Come, my Pierre, come, it’s me!” cried the ploughman, riding toward him and leaping down from his horse to take him in his arms:  “and where’s little Marie?”

“She’s hiding there, because she’s afraid of that bad black man, and so am I.”

“Oh! don’t you be afraid; I am here—­Marie!  Marie! it’s me!”

Marie came crawling out from the bushes, and as soon as she saw Germain, whom the farmer was following close, she ran and threw herself into his arms; and, clinging to him like a daughter to her father, she exclaimed: 

“Ah! my good Germain, you will defend me; I’m not afraid with you.”

Germain shuddered.  He looked at Marie:  she was pale, her clothes were torn by the brambles through which she had run, seeking the thickest underbrush, like a doe with the hunters on her track.  But there was neither despair nor shame on her face.

“Your master wants to speak to you,” he said, still watching her features.

“My master?” she said proudly; “that man is not my master and never will be!—­You are my master, you, Germain.  I want you to take me back with you—­will work for you for nothing!”

The farmer had ridden forward, feigning some impatience.

“Ah! little one,” he said, “you forgot something which I have brought you.”

“No, no, monsieur,” replied little Marie, “I didn’t forget anything, and there’s nothing I want to ask you for—­”

“Hark ye a minute,” said the farmer, “I have something to say to you!—­Come!—­don’t be afraid—­just two words.”

“You can say them out loud.  I have no secrets with you.”

“Come and get your money, at least.”

“My money?  You don’t owe me anything, thank God!”

“I suspected as much,” said Germain in an undertone; “but never mind, Marie, listen to what he has to say to you—­for, for my part, I am curious to find out.  You can tell me afterward:  I have my reasons for that.  Go beside his horse—­I won’t lose sight of you.”

Marie took three steps toward the farmer, who said to her, leaning forward on the pommel of his saddle, and lowering his voice: