After a few minutes she carefully replaced the locket in her breast, wiped her eyes, rose, assembled her goats and walked slowly back to her cottage.
Vaillant came rushing out to jump and fawn upon his mistress.
"My poor Vaillant," said Isaure, passing her hand over the head of her faithful companion, "you are not pleased with me; I am sure of it; I do not play with you as often as I used; I fondle you less; and yet I still love you, you are my faithful companion; but I don't know what is the matter with me, Vaillant; and sometimes it really seems to me as if I were angry with myself for not being so merry as I used to be."
The dog pricked up his ears and looked in the girl's face; one would have thought that he was seeking some means of raising her spirits. Several moments passed, and Vaillant, overjoyed to be caressed by his young mistress, did not stir from her side. But suddenly he lowered his head, walked away from Isaure, and took his stand close to the house door, uttering a low, prolonged growl.
"What is it, Vaillant? What's the matter with you?" said the girl, calling him back to her. But he remained near the door, and would not leave it; he continued to growl, while his eyes expressed his ill humor and an uneasy curiosity.
"Is there anyone there?" continued Isaure. "Can it be that they have come back to see me? or perhaps only one of them?"
At the thought, a deep blush overspread the girl's cheeks. She ran to the door and hastily threw it open; but instead of her young friends, she saw the man who had been wandering about the mountains standing a few yards from her house.
He was standing perfectly still, leaning upon his stout stick; he seemed to be scrutinizing the cottage in every part, and at the same time to be deep in thought; when the door opened and the dog went to him, he did not move; but his piercing black eyes rested upon the girl, who had remained in the doorway.
The stranger's appearance and the expression of his face had at that moment a tinge of gloom, which, combined with the shabbiness of his clothes, inspired a sort of distrust. Isaure had never been so near that man; she had only seen him passing at a distance; but now he was only a few yards away from her, and his glances, spanning that distance, seemed by the smouldering fire that gleamed in them to seek to read the very bottom of the girl's soul.