Their thoughts did not run, perhaps, quite so clearly as that, but that
was the result of it all, and their faces showed it. Furthermore, every
man and woman there began at once to cast about in his and her mind for
the possible murderer, and men looked at the neighbours whom they had
known all their lives, with lurking suspicions in their eyes and the
consideration of strange possibilities in their minds.
Tom Hamon's death had bound them closer together; Peter Mauger's set
them all apart. The strange dead man up in the school-house added to
their discomfort.
It was not until the hastily-constructed litter with its gruesome burden
had been sent off to the Boys' School, in charge of the constables and
the Doctor, that the Senechal caught sight of Nance's eager white face
and anxious eyes, in the crowd that lingered still in answer to another
whisper that had flown round.
If they were at once pig-headed and hot-blooded and suspicious, they
were also warm-hearted and willing to atone for a mistake--once they
were sure of it.
No crowd followed Peter on his last journey but one, though the whole
Island had swarmed after Tom Hamon.
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