The priest, looking up suddenly, discovered what seemed to him to be the portrait standing before its own frame and glaring at him.  Throwing up his hands with an averted head and an “EXORCIS—!” he wheeled and scuffled away.  Dick seized the opportunity, darted through the narrow door on to the rear terrace, and ran, under cover of the shadow of the house, to the steps into the garden.  Luckily for him, this new and unexpected diversion occupied the inmates too much with what was going on in the house to give them time to search outside.  Dick reached the lilac hedge, tore up the hill, and in a few moments threw himself, panting, on his blanket.  In the single look he had cast behind, he had seen that the half-dark salon was now brilliantly lighted—­where no doubt the whole terrified household was now assembled.  He had no fear of being followed; since his confrontation with his own likeness in the mysterious portrait, he understood everything.  The apparently supernatural character of his visitation was made plain; his ruffled vanity was soothed—­his vindication was complete.  He laughed to himself and rolled about, until in his suppressed merriment the rose fell from his bosom, and—­he stopped!  Its freshness and fragrance recalled the innocent young girl he had frightened.  He remembered her gentle, pleading voice, and his cheek flushed.  Well, he had done the best he could in bringing her back to the house—­at the risk of being taken for a burglar—­and she was safe now!  If that stupid French parson didn’t know the difference between a living man and a dead and painted one, it wasn’t his fault.  But he fell asleep with the rose in his fingers.

He was awake at the first streak of dawn.  He again bathed his horse’s shoulder, saddled, but did not mount him, as the beast, although better, was still stiff, and Dick wished to spare him for the journey to still distant Havre, although he had determined to lie over that night at the first wayside inn.  Luckily for him, the disturbance at the chateau had not extended to the forest, for Dick had to lead his horse slowly and could not have escaped; but no suspicion of external intrusion seemed to have been awakened, and the woodland was, evidently, seldom invaded.

By dint of laying his course by the sun and the exercise of a little woodcraft, in the course of two hours he heard the creaking of a hay-cart, and knew that he was near a traveled road.  But to his discomfiture he presently came to a high wall, which had evidently guarded this portion of the woods from the public.  Time, however, had made frequent breaches in the stones; these had been roughly filled in with a rude abatis of logs and treetops pointing towards the road.  But as these were mainly designed to prevent intrusion into the park rather than egress from it, Dick had no difficulty in rolling them aside and emerging at last with his limping steed upon the white high-road.  The creaking cart had passed; it was yet early for traffic, and Dick presently came upon a wine-shop, a bakery, a blacksmith’s shop, laundry, and a somewhat pretentious cafe and hotel in a broader space which marked the junction of another road.