Page:Gilbert Parker--The Lane that had No Turning.djvu/328

312 standing over her, and then stooped and softly put his lips to hers.

"At that moment the gunner up on the hill used the match, and an awful thing happened. With the loud roar the whole hillside of rock and gravel and sand split down, not ten feet in front of the gun, moved with horrible swiftness upon the river, filled its bed, turned it from its course, and, sweeping on, swallowed the Manor House of Beaugard. There had been a crack in the hill, the water of the river had sapped its foundations, and it needed only this shock to send it down.

"And so, as the woman wished: the same hour for herself and the man! And when at last their prison was opened by the hands of Bigot’s men, they were found cheek by cheek, bound in the sacred marriage of Death.

"But another had gone the same road, for, at the awful moment, beside the bursted gun, the dying gunner, Garoche, lifted up his head, saw the loose travelling hill, and said with his last breath: ‘The waters drown them, and the hills bury them, and’ "He had his way with them, and after that perhaps the great God had His way with him—perhaps."