Suddenly one day came the fearful news from England that the plague had broken out and that thousands were dying. The flight from London was like the flight of the children of Israel into the desert. The dead-carts, filled with decaying bodies, rattled through the foul streets, to drop their horrid burdens into the great pit at Aldgate; the bells of London tolled all day and all night for the passing of human souls. Hundreds of homes, isolated because of a victim of the plague found therein, became ghastly breeding-places of the disease, and then silent, disgusting graves. If a man shivered in fear or staggered from weakness, or for very hunger turned sick, he was marked as a victim, and despite his protests was huddled away with the real victims to die the awful death. From every church, where clergy were left to pray, went up the cry for salvation from “plague, pestilence, and famine.” Scores of ships from Holland and from France lay in the Channel, not allowed to touch the shores of England nor permitted to return whence they came. On the very day that news of this reached Jersey came a messenger from the Queen of England for Michel de la Forêt to hasten to her court, for that she had need of him, and need which would bring him honor. Even as the young officer who brought the letter handed it to De la Forêt in the little house on the hill-side above Rozel Bay, he was taken suddenly ill and fell at the Camisard’s feet. De la Forêt straightway raised him in his arms. He called to his wife, but, bidding her not come near, he bore the doomed man away to the lonely Ecréhos rocks lying within sight of their own doorway. Suffering no one to accompany him, he carried the sick man to the boat which had brought the Queen’s messenger to Rozel Bay. The sailors of the vessel fled, and alone De la Forêt set sail for the Ecréhos. There, upon the black rocks, the young man died, and Michel buried him in the shore-bed of the Maître Île. Then, after two days--for he could bear suspense no longer--he set sail for Jersey. Upon that journey there is no need to dwell. Any that hath ever loved a woman and a child must understand. A deep fear held him all the way, and when he stepped on shore at Rozel Bay he was as one who had come from the grave, haggard and old. Hurrying up the hill-side to his doorway, he called aloud to his wife, to his child. Throwing open the door, he burst in. His dead child lay upon a couch, and near by, sitting in a chair, with the sweat of the dying on her brow, was Angèle. As he dropped on his knee beside her, she smiled and raised her hand as if to touch him, but the hand dropped and the head fell forward on his breast. She was gone into a greater peace.