And before I left them I thought it right to explain to Torode just what had happened.
He listened in a cold black fury, but fell soon into a slough of despond.
His life was over, but he was not dead.

For him, as for the rest of us, death would, I think, have been more merciful--and yet, I would not have had him die at my hands.
And so I left the two dumb men on the Ecrehous and returned to Sercq, and of my welcome there I need not tell.
My mother and Aunt Jeanne were full of questionings which taxed my wits to breaking point to evade, especially Aunt Jeanne's.

She tried to trap me in a hundred ways, leading up from the most distant and innocent points to that which had kept me away so long.

And since truth consists as much in not withholding as in telling, I was brought within measurable distance of lying by Aunt Jeanne's pertinacity, for which I think the blame should fairly rest with her.
I told them simply that I had been on matters connected with Torode, and would still be engaged on them for some time to come, and left it there.
Carette, of course, understood, and approved all I had done.

She saw with me the necessity of keeping the matter from my mother, lest her peace of mind should suffer shipwreck again, and to no purpose.