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Such a man came upon him, like a ghost, at noon in the July

weather, as he sat on his heap of stones under a bank, taking

such shelter as he could get from a shower of hail.

The man looked at him, looked at the village in the hollow, at

the mill, and at the prison on the crag. When he had identified

these objects in what benighted mind he had, he said, in a

dialect that was just intelligible:

"How goes it, Jacques?"

"All well, Jacques."

"Touch then!"

They joined hands, and the man sat down on the heap of stones.

"No dinner?"

"Nothing but supper now," said the mender of roads, with a hungry

face.

"It is the fashion," growled the man. "I meet no dinner

anywhere."

He took out a blackened pipe, filled it, lighted it with flint

and steel, pulled at it until it was in a bright glow: then,

suddenly held it from him and dropped something into it from

between his finger and thumb, that blazed and went out in a puff

of smoke.