I came to the church of the Recollets as I wandered; for now,
for a little time, I seemed bewildered and incapable, lost in a
maze of dreadful imaginings. I entered the door of the church,
and stumbled upon a body. Hearing footsteps ahead in the dusk,
I passed up the aisle, and came upon a pile of debris. Looking
up, I could see the stars shining through a hole in the roof,
Hearing a noise beyond, I went on, and there, seated on the high
altar, was the dwarf who had snatched the cup of rum out of
the fire the night that Mathilde had given the crosses to the
revellers. He gave a low, wild laugh, and hugged a bottle to his
breast. Almost at his feet, half naked, with her face on the lowest
step of the altar, her feet touching the altar itself, was the
girl--his sister--who had kept her drunken lover from assaulting
him. The girl was dead--there was a knife-wound in her breast. Sick
at the sight I left the place, and went on, almost mechanically,
to Voban's house. It was level with the ground, a crumpled heap of
ruins. I passed Lancy's house, in front of which I had fought with
Gabord; it too was broken to pieces.
As I turned away I heard a loud noise, as of an explosion, and I
supposed it to be some magazine. I thought of it no more at the
time. Voban must be found; that was more important. I must know
of Alixe first, and I felt sure that if any one guessed her
whereabouts it would be he: she would have told him where she was
going, if she had fled; if she were dead, who so likely to know,
this secret, elusive, vengeful watcher? Of Doltaire I had heard
nothing; I would seek him out when I knew of Alixe.
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