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Updated: June 26, 2025
To realise that she was only a child of thirteen, one had to notice the innocence underlying her full womanly laughter, and especially the child-like delicacy of her chin and soft transparency of her temples. In certain lights Miette's sun-tanned face showed yellow like amber. A little soft black down already shaded her upper lip.
In the darkness, he now saw nothing save Miette, wrapped in the banner, under the trees, with her eyes turned towards heaven. Then the one-eyed man fired, and all was over; the lad's skull burst open like a ripe pomegranate; his face fell upon the stone, with his lips pressed to the spot which Miette's feet had worn that warm spot which still retained a trace of his dead love.
He refused, as though it were sacrilege, and his refusal strengthened Miette's fancies with regard to the dear phantom which bore her name. She positively insisted that the girl had died young, as she was, and in the very midst of her love.
When Silvere had kissed Miette's cheek, he raised his head and observed the mill. "What a long walk we've had!" he exclaimed. "See here is the mill. It must be nearly half-past nine. We must go home." But Miette pouted. "Let us walk a little further," she implored; "only a few steps, just as far as the little cross-road, no farther, really." Silvere smiled as he again took her round the waist.
He was only conscious of the presence of some men around him, and, from a feeling of modesty, he drew the red banner over Miette's breast. Then their eyes still continued to gaze at one another. The conflict, however, was at an end. The death of the receiver of taxes had satiated the soldiers.
All day long Miette's choice had puzzled him, and his curiosity increased when he found himself in the narrow lane formed by the piles of planks at the end of the plot of ground. "She will come this way," he said to himself, looking along the road to Nice.
He had been kneeling forward, but now he sank back, as though thrown down by Miette's last faint sigh. "Dead! Dead!" he repeated; "it is not true, she is looking at me. See how she is looking at me!" Then he caught the doctor by the coat, entreating him to remain there, assuring him that he was mistaken, that she was not dead, and that he could save her if he only would.
Those passionate kisses brought a last gleam of joy to Miette's eyes. They loved one another, and their idyll ended in death. But Silvere could not believe she was dying. "No, you will see, it will prove only a trifle," he declared. "Don't speak if it hurts you. Wait, I will raise your head and then warm you; your hands are quite frozen."
If he had known it, he would have hastened on yet more quickly in order to die on that stone, at the end of the narrow path, in the atmosphere where he could still detect the scent of Miette's breath! Never had he hoped for such consolation in his grief. Heaven was merciful. He waited, a vague smile playing on is face. Mourgue, meantime, had caught sight of the pistols.
They would nod affectionately to each other in order to reassure themselves. Thus the attraction which kept them leaning over the brink had a tinge of secret terror, like all poignant charms. But the well still remained their old friend. Justin, who watched Miette's every movement, never suspected the cause of her eagerness to go and draw some water every morning.
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