Page:Pierre and Jean - Clara Bell - 1902.djvu/228

Rh "Then you approve?"

"Yes, I approve."

"But how strangely you say so! I could fancy that—that you were not glad."

"Yes, indeed, I am—very glad."

"Really and truly?"

"Really and truly."

And to prove it she threw her arms round him and kissed him heartily, with warm motherly kisses. Then, when she had wiped her eyes, which were full of tears, she observed upon the beach a man lying flat at full length like a dead body, his face hidden against the stones; it was the other one, Pierre, sunk in thought and desperation.

At this she led her little Jean farther away, quite to the edge of the waves, and there they talked for a long time of this marriage on which he had set his heart.

The rising tide drove them back to rejoin the fishers, and then they all made their way to the shore. They roused Pierre, who pretended to be sleeping; and then came a long dinner washed down with many kinds of wine.