"On the contrary, mon enfant," she answered, "I shall be doing you the greatest kindness, and no more than my duty, in taking you back there; and we have agreed that you shall return with me at once."

"I will not go!" cried Madelon, wildly; "I cannot, I will not!—I will not! Do you hear? What right have you to take me? I am not your child!—I will not go with you!"

She got up as she spoke, confronting the Countess, and trying to throw all the energy of which she was capable into her vehement words. But even in her own ears her voice sounded shrill and weak, and seemed to die away as if she were talking in her sleep; the very strength of her emotion appeared unreal, and failing her when she most needed it: her words seemed to have no meaning, and as she finished speaking, she dropped down on her seat again with a little sob, feeling that she was conquered, for she had no power of resistance left in her.

So she lay upon the sofa in a sot of doze, while a tribunal of three sat upon, condemned, and sentenced this poor little criminal, who knew nothing of what they were saying after she had made her own ineffectual little protest. Madame Bertrand, indeed, good old soul, with the softest and kindest of hearts, would not at first hear of her being sent away; she was fond of the child, she said; she had known her for years, and felt sure there was something in her story that they did not yet understand. But Madame Bertrand was old—moreover, she was not a little in awe of the niece whom she had called in to assist her failing powers; moreover, she had perhaps a lurking idea that they might after all be right, and that there was something exceptionally heinous in running away from a convent; so she was soon overruled by the other two, who settled the matter in a very summary way—Madelon must return to the convent with Madame la Comtesse that very day.

She was roused up presently, and made to drink some wine by Madame Bertrand, who was in despair because she could eat none of the good things she had provided, and felt nothing but and old traitress, as Madelon stood up at last, looking about her with dazed eyes; and then, without further opposition, submissively put on her hat, took up her bundle, and prepared to follow the Countess. Indeed, had Madame Bertrand known how recently the child had recovered from a long illness, nothing, I think, would have induced her to let her go; but she only supposed she was over-tired with her strange night journey; and, in fact, the wine and the rest together had so far revived Madelon that she appeared quite capable of walking down to the station with the Countess. Madame Bertrand gave her great hug as she wished her good-bye, and was perhaps a little aggrieved at the passive way in which Madelon received it.

"If ever you want help, come back to me—will you not, mon enfant?—and I will help you, if I can."

"Yes," said Madelon; "but they will not let me run away again; will they?"

"Let you run away, ma petite?"

"Yes—Aunt Therese, you know. She won't let me do it again."

"Your aunt? You told me she was dead;" cried Madame.

"Yes, so she is," said Madelon. "I was forgetting, I think. Good-bye, Madame Bertrand. You will let me stay next time, will you not? But I must go now?" And she followed the Countess out of the house without another word.

Madame la Comtesse, having got her own way, was kind enough to the child who had so unwittingly strayed across her path. When they reached the station she gave her her ticket, made her sit down in the waiting-room, and even offered her refreshment in the interval before the train started. Indeed, we should err if we attributed to the Countess, whom this little episode in our Madelon's history has brought for the second, and we may trust for the last, time before us—we should err, I say, in attributing to her any feeling of ill-will towards Madelon, or any special interest in her conduct or fate. Neither need it be imagined that she was actuated by any large views of duty towards the world in general: she was not at all benevolent, but neither was she particularly ill-natured; she was merely a shallow-minded, frivolous woman, who, having long since lowered her standard of perfection to suit her own attainments, saw fit to measure every one else by her own narrow ideal, and to set them right where they proved themselves wanting—a convenient process, which enabled her to satisfy her vague sense of duty, and right and wrong, without any reference to her own possible shortcomings. In capturing our little stray Madelon, and taking her back to the convent, she felt she was doing a deed that would afford her matter for self-congratulation for days to come; and she was gracious and affable accordingly, speaking to Madelon in a tone of condescending good-nature, which was quite lost upon the child, who was beyond caring for kindness or unkindness just then. She was only conscious of some terrible burden, which she could not define nor reason upon, but which seemed to oppress and weigh her down, making her incapable of thought, or speech, or motion. When they got into the railway-carriage she could only lean back in the corner, with a general sense that something dreadful had happened, or was going to happen; but that her head ached too much, and felt too confused, for her to remember what it was all about.

They changed carriages at Pepinster, and, still in the same dream of misery, Madelon followed the Countess from one train to another. They set off again, but presently, as the slackening speed showed that they were approaching another station, she suddenly woke up to the keenest perception of her situation, with a quickening of her numbed senses to the most vivid realization of all she had lost, of all she might have to endure. Ah! it was all true, and no dream—she had run away from the convent to make Monsieur Horace's fortune; and she had not done it, and now all was over, and she was being taken back to the convent—and there would be no more chance of escape for her—never more. In the agony of this thought she turned towards the Countess, with a half-formed intention of throwing herself at her feet, and imploring, in such voice and accents as should admit of no refusal, to be allowed to go away—anyhow, anywhere, only as far as possible from Liege. But she checked herself as she saw that the Countess, with a handkerchief thrown over her face, had comfortably composed herself to sleep in one corner, and a new idea suggested itself as the train stopped at a little village station. The child glanced towards the woman; she still slept, or appeared to do so, and the next moment Madelon had opened the door, and, taking up her bundle, had slid swiftly and silently out of the carriage.

The train moved on, and a drowsy Countess might presently awake to find with astonishment that she was alone in the compartment; but our little Madelon, left standing on the platform, had slipped out of her sight and knowledge for ever.

CHAPTER XIII.

The Restaurant at Le Trooz.

The train disappeared, and our forlorn little Madelon remained standing alone on the platform. Forlorn, indeed! It was raining hard now, a thick, persistent drizzle, through which everything looked dim and blurred, and which was almost as dense as the low-hanging mists that hid the tops of the hills. Madelon stood still and shivered for a minute, clutching her little bundle under her cloak, and trying to collect her ideas.

Not a hundred yards off was the village, lying between the hills in the next valley to Chaudfontaine, and not more than three miles from that place, but shut out from it by a barrier of rocky, wooded hill, round which there was only just space for the road and stream to wind; an amphibious little village, half in and half out of the water apparently, for it stood just where the stream spread out in wide shallows, round low islands, on and amongst which the houses were clustered and scattered. Madelon instinctively turned towards it; she had the very vaguest idea in her poor, bewildered little brain as to where she was, or what she was going to do, only one thing obvious in the surrounding uncertainties—that she could not remain standing on the platform in the pouring rain. She gave up her ticket mechanically, passed through the gate, and followed the muddy road leading to the cottages. She was very tired, she had never felt quite so tired before, and her knees trembled as they had done that day when the fever came on at the convent; she was so dizzy too, that she had to stop now and then, to grasp the one fact of her being where she was and not somewhere else altogether; her single idea was to go on walking until—until when? That was a question she could not have answered, only somewhere she must go, where she would be out of the way of countess or nuns, or any other enemy who might be lying in wait to pounce upon her. This was all she thought about as she passed along the village street, which was dull and deserted-looking enough on this wet, grey afternoon, till the sight of a church with an open door, suggested something quite different, and which was a positive relief after that nightmare motion of walking perpetually with failing limbs, and a sense of pursuit behind. She would go in there, and sit down and rest for a little while. By-and-by, when the giddiness and trembling had gone off, she would be better able to think of what she should do; she would be out of the rain, too, there—the cold rain, which had already drenched her cloak and skirt.

She went in; it was a village church of the simplest description, very small, with plain wooden benches and confessionals, and a high altar with inexpensive decorations, in nowise remarkable. But hardly was Madelon inside the door, when she stood suddenly motionless, transfixed by a horrible terror that, weak and exhausted as she was, wholly seized and gained possession of her; for, raised in the middle of the aisle, covered with a black velvet pall and with a row of tall candles on either side, stood a coffin, with white embroidery of death's heads on the pall, and little banners with painted death's heads decorating every candle. To the terrified, speechless child, the skulls seemed to become animated—to grin; they seemed to move; the whole air was suddenly full of them, chattering, dancing, swarming round her; she tried to scream, but could not; she turned to fly from the dreadful, haunted spot, but with the first step she made, strength and consciousness gave way altogether, and she sank senseless to the ground.

Ten minutes later, a woman of the village, coming in to see the preparations for the funeral of Monsieur N——, lately one of the great proprietors of the neighbourhood, nearly stumbled over Madelon's prostrate form. She started back, half uttering an exclamation of surprise and alarm; then, seeing that it was a child who was lying so still upon the stone floor, she knelt down by her, laid her head in her lap, and began rubbing her hands. Madelon was not quite unconscious, apparently, for she moved her head uneasily, and uttered a low moan. "She is not dead, at any rate," muttered the woman, still chafing the cold little hands, while she studied the small white face, the short rings of hair just appearing under the hat all crushed in her fall, the bundle lying at her side, and the worn frock and cloak soaked with rain. "I wonder if she is alone?" added the woman to herself. She glances round the empty church, then gently laying Madelon on the floor again, with a cushion to support her head, she went to the door, and peered out into the rain for a few moments; then, returning, without calling for help, or summoning any one, she stooped down, took Madelon in her arms—which, indeed, she was well able to do, for she was a tall, strong woman, between thirty and forty, and the child was very slight and thin after her recent illness—and carried her out of the church, down the street, towards the end of the village. No one was stirring in the pouring rain, or seemed to notice her, except one or two boys, who ran after her shouting and singing—"Eh, Jeanne-Marie, Jeanne-Marie—what have you got to-day, Jeanne-Marie?" And to them she gave no sort of heed, walking steadily and swiftly on, without even turning her head, till she paused before a low, white-washed cottage, standing a little apart from the village, between the poplars that bordered the road. In front was a bench, and on one side a vine, all dripping and forlorn, was trained over a trellis that sloped from the roof, and, with wooden supports, made a shelter for a row of bee-hives placed on a plank beneath; under the front gable was a wicker contrivance for pigeons, and below it, in large gold letters on a blue board, the words, "Cafe et Restaurant." The door opened at once into the little public room of the humblest pretentions, furnished with a cupboard containing a store of bottles and glasses, a stove in one corner, above it some bright copper tea-kettles, a dozen chairs, and a deal table pushed near the one small window that looked out on the road and the stream beyond, and then across fields, and meadows, and trees, to the hills. A man, with a heavy, loutish face and figure, was sitting with his arms on the table, twirling a glass about in his fingers, a bottle half full of vine before him. He turned round as Jeanne-Marie entered with Madelon in her arms, and rising slowly went towards them.

"Eh, Jeanne-Marie, what have you got there?" he said.

"Does that concern you?" answered the woman sharply enough; "drink your wine, Jacques Monnier, and do not trouble yourself with other people's affairs."

"Est-elle morte, la petite?" asked Jacques, recoiling at the sight of Madelon's white face.

"Est-elle morte?" repeated Jeanne-Marie, "and with her eyes as wide open as yours! Allons, mon enfant, du courage," she added, as Madelon opened her eyes for a moment; but she closed them again, and the woman looking round, said, "There will be no peace here, with you men coming in and out. Open that door for me, Jacques," pointing to one nearly opposite the entrance.

The man obeyed. It opened at the bottom of the ladder-like staircase, a gleam of light from above, showing where another door at the top step led into a small bed-room. Jeanne-Marie carried Madelon upstairs like a baby, took off her hat and damp cloak, laid her on the bed, and then ran downstairs again for a glass of cordial.

Madelon, however, was already reviving, and when Jeanne-Marie went up to her again, she raised herself on the bed, resting on one elbow, and fixed her large eyes upon the woman, first with a look of blank unconsciousness, and then with a sudden light of terror in them, as of some wild hunted thing just caught by its pursuers.

"Don't take me back to the convent!" she cried in sharp, piteous accents; "don't take me back; I can't go, I can't—no, no, no!"

"No one shall take you back," said Jeanne-Marie, trying to soothe her. But she paid no heed.

"Indeed I can't go. Ah, Madame, you said you knew papa; have pity upon me! I promised him I would never be a nun. He died, you know, and sent me to the convent at Liege to be with Aunt Therese; but he made me promise before he died. I can't go back—I should die too. Ah, Madame, have pity on me!"

She was kneeling on the bed now, her hands clasped with her pitiful little imploring gesture. Jeanne-Marie came close to her, and smoothed back her hair caressingly with her rough work-a-day fingers.

"Soyez tranquille, mon enfant," she said, "you shall not be taken back to the convent, and no one shall make you a nun."

"You promise?" said Madelon, catching hold of her arm, and looking into her face with eager, suspicious eyes; "you promise not to take me back?"

"Yes, I promise," said the woman; "fear nothing, ma petite."

"And you won't tell Aunt Therese that I ran away? For she would be so angry, you know; she wanted to make me a nun like herself; you won't tell her—you won't, you won't?"

"No, no," said Jeanne-Marie. "I will tell nothing, you are quite safe here; now lie down and be quiet, and I will give you something nice to drink."

But Madelon's eyes wandered; the terrified look came again, and she clung tighter and tighter to Jeanne-Marie.

"Please ask Aunt Therese to go away!" she cried; "she is standing there in the corner of the room, staring at me; she will not move—there—there she is, don't you see? Oh, tell her to go away—she stares at me so, and oh! there is a coffin at her side, it is all over death's heads; Aunt Therese has a death's head—oh! take me away, take me away!"

With a shriek of terror the child threw herself back on the bed, covering her eyes with her hands, burying her face in the pillow.

Jeanne-Marie went to the top of the stairs and called "Jacques Monnier!"

"Hein?" said the man, coming slowly to the door below, and standing with his broad figure framed in it.

"Jacques," said Jeanne-Marie, "go at once for the doctor, and tell him to come here, for some one is very ill."

"Hein?" said Jacques again, "does that concern me? I must attend to my own affairs, and finish my wine, Jeanne-Marie."

"If you do not go this moment," said the woman, with a little stamp of her foot, "you shall never taste my wine again, with or without payment, Jacques, et je tiens parole, moi!"

"There is other wine to be had in Le Trooz," answered the man sulkily, but moving nevertheless towards the entrance, when she was recalled by Jeanne-Marie.

"Jacques," she said, coming two or three steps down the stairs, "if Monsieur le Docteur inquires who is ill, you will say it is my niece."

"But she is then your niece, la petite," said Jacques, scratching his head as an outward expression of some inward perplexity.

"You will tell Monsieur le Docteur what I say," repeated Jeanne-Marie imperiously, "and make haste;" and she went upstairs again, and closed the bed-room with a certain emphasis, as though to prevent further discussion.

Madelon was still lying on the bed, with her face buried in the pillow; a violent shivering of cold or of fear had seized her, but she resisted Jeanne-Marie's efforts to raise her with the obstinacy of a strong will acted on by intense physical alarm. But at length the woman's persuasive words appeared to have a soothing effect, though she seemed scarcely to take in their meaning, for she allowed herself to be undressed and put into bed, and after taking some warm drink, fell into a restless, starting sleep.

Jeanne-Marie drew a curtain across the small window, so as to shut out the slanting sunbeams, which were pouring into the room, on to the patchwork quilt and white pillow where the little feverish head lay so uneasily; then, taking up her knitting, she sat down by the bedside, and as she mechanically added row after row to the blue worsted stocking, she reflected. From Madelon's few distracted words, she imagined that she knew the state of the case very well; it was one not unprecedented, and presented no difficulties to either comprehension of belief. "They wanted to bring her up as a nun, and so she ran away. Well, thou hast done wisely, little one; I also know something of convents and nuns, and if it depends on me to protect thee, they shall not touch thee, mon enfant." This was her final resolution as she sat knitting and reflecting, with a great sympathy with, and tenderness for, the poor little terrified, hunted girl, lying there at her mercy.

Such tenderness, and power of sympathy with distress, were indeed amongst Jeanne-Marie's strongest characteristics, hidden though they were under a harsh, imperious manner and exterior. For she too had had a strange, sad, troublous life, with tragedy and sorrow enough in it, which it does not concern us to relate here, and which were yet of no small concern to our little Madelon, as she lay there, dependent on this one woman for freedom, shelter, and even existence. For if, as is surely the case, in our life of to-day lies a whole prophecy of our life in the future, if in our most trivial actions is hidden the germ of our greatest deeds, then our most momentous decision in some sudden emergency, is but the sure consummation and fruition of each unnoticed detail, our action of to-day but the inevitable result of a whole precious lifetime of preparation for some unforeseen crisis. So, too, from a present habit of thought, much may be surmised as to what has been done and suffered in the past; and though little was known about Jeanne-Marie, some inferences might have been drawn concerning her former life, had any of her neighbours been skilled in the inductive method, or been sufficiently interested in the woman to study her character closely. But in fact they cared very little about her. It is true that when she had first come into the village, there had been many conjectures about her set afloat. She did not belong to that part of the country, she could not even speak the Liege patois, and never took the trouble to learn it, invariably using the French language. She had no belongings, and never spoke of her former life; so that it was not long before a vague, open-mouthed curiosity, seizing upon a thousand untested hints and rumours to satisfy itself withal, led the villagers to whisper among themselves that some strange history was attached to her; and woe to that woman who, in a small village, is accredited with a strange history that no one knows anything about! But Jeanne-Marie had outlived all this; her secrets, if she had any, were never revealed either then or later, and in time people had ceased to trouble themselves about her. She led a silent, solitary life, resenting perhaps the suspicion with which she had at first been received, and holding aloof from her neighbours as they held aloof from her. Her restaurant was well attended, for she gave the best wine in the village, was liberal, and of an honesty above suspicion; but even the men who were her most constant customers did not like her, and were half afraid of her. She held imperious rule among them, issuing imperative commands which she expected to be obeyed, and enforcing strict order and regularity in her house. To the women of the village her manners were cold, abrupt, and reserved; she never stopped to gossip or chatter; she would come and go about her business without an unnecessary word, and the women, looking after her, had ceased to do more than shrug their shoulders, and resume the flow of talk her silent presence had checked.

But it was, after all, only the gay, and prosperous, and happy that she shunned. The poor, the friendless, the erring, the rejected of this world, were certain to find in Jeanne-Marie a friend who never failed, one who looked out for the sorrowful and broken-hearted, and never passed by on the other side. Even the village children knew to whom to run when hurt, or unhappy, or in disgrace, sure of getting consolation and sugar-plums from the sad, lonely woman, though equally sure of being sent away as soon as their tears were dried, and their troubles forgotten. If the poor, abused Ugly Duckling of Hans Andersen's tale had strayed on a wintry day to her door, she would have taken it in, and nourished, and cherished it all through the cold, dark weather; but when the summer was come, and the duckling grown into a swan, spread its broad white wings against the blue sky, she would have watched it fly away without word or sign to detain it; she would have had nothing in common with it then.

So to Jeanne-Marie it seemed the simplest thing in the world, that, having found Madelon in need of help, she should help her at the cost of any trouble to herself; that she should take in, and cherish this poor little stray girl without inquiry, without hope, or thought of reward. At Madelon, happy, successful, contented, Jeanne-Marie would not have looked a second time; but for Madelon, forsaken, shelterless, dependent on her, she would have been ready almost to lay down her life.

In about half an hour, Jacques Monnier returned with the doctor. He knew Jeanne-Marie well, as he knew everyone in the village, and went at once upstairs to the little bedroom where Madelon was lying.

"Your niece, I think Jacques Monnier told me?" he said, after watching Madelon for a minute as she lay in her uneasy sleep.

"Yes," said Jeanne-Marie with a certain sullenness of manner, which she was apt to display towards her superiors in station.

"Has she been here long?" said the doctor, feeling Madelon's pulse, but looking steadily at the woman; "when was she taken ill? How is it you have not called me in before?"

"Look here, Monsieur le Docteur," answered Jeanne-Marie with a sort of stolid defiance, "I called you in to tell me what to do for the child, not to put me through a catechism. She fainted away this morning, and when she came to herself again, she began to rave and talk nonsense, so I sent for you. Now tell me what is to be done."

Just then Madelon opened her eyes.

"Do you not know me, Madame?" she said. "I am Madeleine Linders, and papa is dead; he sent me to be with Aunt Therese, but she is dead too—Oh, save me, save me!" she cried, springing up with all the old terror upon her; "don't let them take me, papa, you made me promise that I would not stay there. Tell Aunt Therese to go away, papa; papa, save me!" and she clung to the doctor's arm. "Besides, you know," she went on, speaking fast and eagerly, "I promised him—Monsieur Horace, you know—and I must keep it, I must keep my promise to Monsieur Horace,—I must, I must!"

"You hear?" said Jeanne-Marie, as Madelon fell back on the pillow again muttering to herself.

"I hear," answered the doctor, "and I see that she is in a high fever, and it may go hard with her, poor child! It is fortunate she is with you, Jeanne-Marie," he went on, kindly, "for you are a capital nurse, I know; but I am afraid it will be a long business."

"That is no matter," she answered.

"If you would like to have her removed to the hospital at Liege," continued the doctor, doubtfully, "it might still be done. It may injure your business to have her here. Still, as you say she is your niece——"

"As I say she is my niece," returned Jeanne-Marie, abruptly, "it is not likely I should turn her out of the house, and that is enough. My business will take care of itself. And now tell me what I am to do, doctor?"

He prescribed for Madelon, said he would call again, and left the house, pondering on the woman who kept so apart from her neighbours, and on her small visitor, who he knew well enough was not her niece, for had not Jacques Monnier told him how Jeanne-Marie had suddenly come in out of the rain, carrying the girl in her arms, and had taken her upstairs without a word of explanation?

"There is a mystery somewhere," thought the doctor; "but it is no concern of mine." And so he went his way to visit his next patient.

Jeanne-Marie had no fears concerning the doctor's discretion; he was a man too busy in his scattered district to have much time or inclination for gossip. But she had far less confidence in Jacques Monnier's wisdom, and thought it not inexpedient to go downstairs, after the doctor's departure, and give her customer a word of exhortation. He was seated at the table as before, twirling the glass in his fingers, and gazing vacantly out of window.

"Well, Jacques," said Jeanne-Marie, "and what did you tell the doctor?"

"I told him what you told me," said the man, in a surly voice.

"What was that?"

"That your niece was ill, and that he was to come and see her."

"Was that all?"

No answer.

"Was that all?" repeated Jeanne-Marie. "Allons, Jacques, don't keep me waiting. I will know what you said to the doctor."

Jacques, who under other circumstances might have met this imperative mode of questioning by dogged silence, or an evasive answer, was too uncertain as to what the doctor himself might have repeated to Jeanne-Marie, to attempt equivocation.

"I told him," he said, slowly and reluctantly, "that it was a queer thing you should have picked up your niece in the street, and that I didn't believe she was your niece at all; and no more I do, Jeanne-Marie," he added, gaining courage as he spoke.

"Ah! you told him that?" said the woman. "Well, look you, Jacques, if I find you saying any such thing again, this is the very last time you cross my door-step, and that account of yours will have to be paid in full next week. You understand?"

"Oh! yes, I understand well enough," he answered sulkily; "but if I hold my tongue the neighbours will talk; I am not the only person who saw you come through the street, I will answer for it."

"Who said I came through the village at all? And what does it matter to you what the neighbours say?" retorted Jeanne-Marie, "attend to what I say—that is enough for you, Jacques—and if you do hear anyone say anything about the child upstairs, tell them it is my niece come on a visit, and not a word more; otherwise you understand——"

"Oh! yes, I understand," he repeated grumbling, "but what do I care? Yours is not the only wine to be had in Le Trooz——"

"Bah!" was Jeanne-Marie's only answer, as she left the room. She knew her customer too well to be in the least afraid of his carrying his implied threat into execution. Indeed, Jacques Monnier, who had no mind to be ousted from the convenient little restaurant, where he got good wine and long credit, acted upon the hints he had received, and stuck manfully to Jeanne-Marie's version of her adventure. And so it happened, that although for a day or two a few rumours were afloat in the village, they soon died away; and it was received as an established fact by those who cared to interest themselves in Jeanne-Marie's affairs, that it was her niece whom the doctor went to see so regularly. And so much apart did Jeanne-Marie keep from her neighbours, that the subject was soon half-forgotten, and Madelon's very existence seemed problematic, as she lay in the little upstairs room, and the woman who sheltered her, appeared to come and go about her business much the same as usual.

As for Jeanne-Marie, as soon as the house was quiet, on the evening of that day so eventful for our little Madelon, she sat down and wrote two letters: one she put into a large envelope, which she directed to a street in Paris; the other, inclosed in the first, was addressed to the Superior of the Convent at Liege, and the letters, with their Paris direction, were put into the post that very night.

CHAPTER XIV.

Madelon's Convalescence.

Madelon, if she had but known it, had small reason to apprehend any very vigorous pursuit on the part of the nuns. There was, it is true, no small commotion in the convent, when Soeur Lucie, entering Madelon's cell the morning after her flight, found the empty room, the unslept-on bed. She did not indeed realize at first that the child had run away; but when, after inquiry and search through the whole convent, she found that nothing had been seen or heard of her, since she herself had quitted the cell the previous evening, then the whole truth became apparent, and a general sense of consternation pervaded the sisterhood. It was the enormity of the offence that struck them aghast, the boldness of the attempt, and its complete success. It was altogether a new idea to them that any one should wish to escape from those walls; an appalling one that any one should make such an attempt, and succeed. Soeur Lucie, held responsible for Madelon, was summoned before the Superior, questioned, cross-questioned, and, amid tears and sobs, could only repeat that she had left her charge as usual, the evening before; and that, in the morning, going to her cell, had discovered that she had vanished; how, or when, or whither, she could not imagine. How she had escaped was indeed at first a mystery, which could not fail to rouse an eager curiosity in the sisters, and a not unpleasing excitement succeeded the first indignation, as, with one accord, they ran to examine Madelon's room. The window stood wide open, the branches of the climbing rose-trees were broken here and there, small footsteps could be traced on the flower- bed below. It was all that was needed to make their supposition a certainty—Madelon had run away.

This point settled, a calmer feeling began to prevail, and, as their first consternation subsided, the nuns began to reflect that after all worse things might have happened. If it had been one of themselves indeed, that would have been a very different matter; such a sin, such a scandal could not even be thought of without horror. But this little stray girl, who belonged to nobody, whom nobody had cared for, who had been a trouble ever since she had come, and who had been left a burthen and a responsibility on their hands—why should they concern themselves so much about her flight? No doubt she had made her escape to some friends she had known before she was brought to the convent, from no one knew where, two or three years ago. The nuns were not more averse than other people to the drawing of convenient conclusions from insufficient premises, and this theory of Madelon's having run away to her friends once started, every one was ready to add their mite of evidence in aid of its confirmation. Some thought she had possibly started for England—it was an Englishman who had brought her to the convent; others that she had friends in Paris—it certainly was from Paris she had come; one suggested one thing, and one another, and in the meantime, though inquiries were made, the search was neither very energetic nor very determined. When the evening came, it was generally felt to be rather a relief than otherwise that nothing had been heard of the small runaway. What could they do with her if she came back? No one felt disposed to put in a claim for her— least of all Soeur Lucie, whom she had brought into terrible disgrace, and who had yet been really fond of the child, and who for months after had a pang in her kind little heart whenever she thought of her wayward charge. And so, when, two days later, a letter, with neither date nor signature, but bearing a Paris post-mark, arrived for the Superior, announcing that Mademoiselle Madeleine Linders was with friends, and that it was useless for any one to attempt to find her or reclaim her, for they had her in safe keeping, and would never consent to part with her, every one felt that the matter was arranged in the most satisfactory manner possible, and troubled themselves no more.

As for the Countess G——, there had been a flatness about the termination of her share in Madelon's adventures that effectually put a stop to any desire on her part to pursue the matter further; and finding, on her arrival at Liege, that her husband was obliged to start for Brussels that very afternoon, she found it convenient altogether to dismiss the subject from her mind. With her departure from Liege, we also gladly dismiss her from these pages for ever.

So Madelon, tossing and moaning on her bed of sickness, is once more all alone in the world, except for Jeanne-Marie, to whom, before two days were over, she had somehow become the one absorbing interest in life. The lonely woman, whose sympathies and affections had, as one might guess, been all bruised, and warped, and crushed in some desperate struggle, or in some long agony, found a new channel for them in an indescribable, yearning love for the little pale girl whom she had rescued, and by whose side she sat hour after hour, wondering, as she listened to her wild broken talk about her father and Monsieur Horace, Aunt Therese, and Soeur Lucie, what the child's past life could have been, and by what strange chances she had come to be in such evil straits. A new world of hopes and fears, of interests and anxieties, seemed to have suddenly opened for Jeanne-Marie, as she sat in the little upper chamber; whilst in the public room downstairs the rough men, in obedience to her word, sat silently drinking and smoking, or talking in subdued voices, so that no disturbing sound might reach the sick child above.

Madelon's second attack of fever was far worse than the first. Weakened as she was by her former illness, it was an almost hopeless fight with death that was carried on for days; and when the crisis came at last, the doctor himself declared that it was scarcely possible that she should rally, and be restored to life and reason. But the crisis passed, and Madelon was once more safe. She awoke about midnight to the confused consciousness of a strange room, perplexing her with unfamiliar surroundings. A dim light burned before the coloured picture of a saint that hung on the rough white- washed wall, and by its uncertain gleams she could distinguish the rude furniture, the patchwork quilt, the heavy rafters that crossed above her head. The window stood wide open, letting in the night scents of the flowers in the garden below; she could see a space of dark, star-lit sky; and hear the rustling of the trees, the whispering of the breeze among the vine-leaves that clustered about the window. Her eyes wandered round with vague bewilderment, the flickering light and long shadows only seeming to confuse her more, as she tried to reconcile her broken, shadowy memories with the present realities, which seemed more dreamlike still.

The door opened, and Jeanne-Marie came in, holding another candle, which she shaded with her hand, as she stood by the bed for a moment, looking down upon Madelon.

"You are better," she said at last, setting down the candle on the table behind her, and smoothing the pillow and coverlet. Her voice was like her face, harsh and melancholy, but with a tender, pathetic ring in it at times.

"Am I?" said Madelon. "Have I been ill again? Where is Soeur Lucie? This is not the convent—where am I?"

"You are not at the convent now," answered Jeanne-Marie. "I am taking care of you, and you must lie very still, and go to sleep again when you have taken this."

Madelon drank off her medicine, but she was not satisfied, and in a moment her brain was at work again.

"I can't make out where I am," she said, looking up at Jeanne- Marie with the old wistful look in her eyes—"is it in an hotel? —is papa coming? I thought I was at the convent with Aunt Therese. Ah! do help me!"

"I will tell you nothing unless you lie still," said Jeanne- Marie, as Madelon made a most futile attempt to raise herself in bed. She considered a moment, and then said—"Don't you remember, ma petite? Your papa is dead, and you are not at the convent any more, and need not go back there unless you like. You are with me, Jeanne-Marie, at Le Trooz, and I will take care of you till you are well. Now you are not to talk any more."

Madelon lay silent for a minute. "Yes, I remember," she said at last, slowly. "Papa is dead, and Monsieur Horace—he is not here?" she cried, with startling eagerness.

"No, no," said Jeanne-Marie, "no one is here but me."

"Because you know," Madelon went on, "I cannot see him yet—I cannot—it would not do to see him, you know, till—till—ah! you do not know about that——" She stopped suddenly, and Jeanne- Marie smoothed the pillow again with her rough, kindly hands.

"I know that you must go to sleep now, and that I shall not say a word more to you to-night," she said; and then, without heeding Madelon's further questions, she put out the light, and sat silently by the bedside till the child was once more asleep.

Madelon did not recover readily from this second attack. Even when she was pronounced wholly out of danger, there were the weariest days to be passed, relapses, weakness, languor. Flowers bloomed and faded in the garden below, the scent of the roses perfumed the air, the red-tipped vine-shoots growing upwards narrowed the space of blue sky seen through the little window, till the sun shone in softened by a screen of glowing green leaves; and all through these lengthening summer days our pale little Madelon lay on her sick bed, very still, and patient, and uncomplaining, and so gentle and grateful to Jeanne-Marie, who nursed and watched her unceasingly with her harsh tenderness, that a passionate affection seized the hard, lonely woman, for the forlorn little stranger who was so dependent upon her, and who owed everything to her compassion and care.

It was not long before a recollection of the past came back to Madelon, sufficiently clear, until the moment of her jumping out of the train at Le Trooz; after that she could remember nothing distinctly, only a general sense of misery, and pain, and terror. She asked Jeanne-Marie numberless questions, as to how and where she had found her, and what she had said.

"How did you know that I had run away from the convent?" she asked.

"You said so," answered Jeanne-Marie. "You were afraid that your aunt would come and take you back."

"Aunt Therese is dead," said Madelon. "I remember it all very well now. Did I tell you that? And did I tell you about papa, too? How strange that I should not remember having said so many things," she added, as the woman replied in the affirmative.

"Not at all strange," replied Jeanne-Marie. "People often talk like that when ill, and recollect nothing of it afterwards."

"Still, it is very odd," said Madelon, musing; and then she added, suddenly, "Did I talk of any one else?"

"Of plenty of people," replied Jeanne-Marie. "Soeur Lucie, and Soeur Francoise, and numbers of others."

"Ah! yes; but I don't mean in the convent!—any one out of the convent, I mean? Did I talk of—Monsieur Horace?"

"Sometimes," said Jeanne-Marie, counting her stitches composedly.

"What did I say about him?" asked Madelon, anxiously. "Please will you tell me? I can't remember, you know."

Jeanne-Marie looked at her for a moment, and then said, rather bluntly,—

"Nothing that anybody could understand. You called to him, and then you told him not to come; that was all, and not common sense either."

"Ah, that is all right," said Madelon, satisfied; her secret at least was safe, and never, never, should it be revealed till she had accomplished her task. As she once more mentally recorded this little vow, she looked at Jeanne-Marie, who was still sitting by her bedside knitting.

"Jeanne-Marie," she said in her tired, feeble little voice, and putting out one of her small thin hands, "you are very, very good to me; I can't think how any one can be so kind as you are; I shall love you all my life. What would have become of me if you had not found me and taken such care of me?"

"What will become of you if you don't leave off talking, and do as the doctor bids you?" said Jeanne-Marie, stopping her little speech; "he said you were to be quite quiet, and here have you been chattering this half-hour; now I am going to get your dinner."

As she became stronger, Madelon would sometimes have long conversations with Jeanne-Marie—in which she would tell her much about her past life, of her father, of how happy she had been as a little child, of how miserable she had been in the convent, and of how she had hated the life there. But more often she would lie still for hours, almost perfectly silent, thinking, brooding over something—Jeanne-Marie would wonder what. Madelon never told her; she had begun to love and cling to the woman, almost the only friend she had in the world, but not even in her would she confide; she had made the resolution to tell no one of her plans and hopes, to trust no one, lest her purpose should in any way be frustrated; and she kept to it, though at the cost of some pain and trouble, so natural is it to seek for help and sympathy.

Madelon's fixed idea had returned to her with redoubled force since her illness. Her one failure had only added intensity to her purpose since her first sense of discouragement had passed away; there was something in the child's nature that refused to acknowledge defeat as such, and she was only eager to begin again. Our poor little Madelon, with her strange experiences and inexperiences, her untutored faiths and instincts, shaking off all rule, ignorant of all conventionalities, only bent, amidst difficulties, and obstacles, and delays, on steadily working towards one fixed and well-defined end—surely, tried by any of the received laws of polite society, concerning correct, well-educated young ladies of thirteen, she would be found sadly wanting. Shall we blame her? or shall we not rather, with a kindly compassion, try for a while to understand from what point of view she had learnt to look at life, and to arrive at some comprehension of, and sympathy with her.

In the meantime, though it was evident she could do nothing till she was well again, an old perplexity was beginning to trouble Madelon; what was she to do without money? Once, a strange chance—which, with a touch of convent superstition that had been grafted on her mind, she was half disposed to look upon as miraculous—had provided the requisite sum, but the most sanguine hopes could hardly point to the repetition of such a miracle or chance, and during long hours, when Jeanne-Marie was attending to her customers below, or sitting at her side, knitting, Madelon's brain was for ever working on this old problem that had proved so hard before, when she sat thinking it out in the convent cell. But at any rate she was free here; she might come and go without scaling walls, or fear of pursuing nuns; and then could she not earn some money? The thought was an inspiration to Madelon—yes, when she was strong and well enough, she would work day and night till she had gained it. If she were only well.

It was about this time that Jeanne-Marie perceived a change in her patient, hitherto so still and resigned, a certain uneasy restlessness and longing to be up and about again.

"Jeanne-Marie, do you think I shall soon be well?" she would ask again and again; "do you think the doctor will soon let me get up?"

"You will never be well if you toss about like that," Jeanne- Marie said grimly, one evening; "lie still, and I will tell you some stories."

She sat down by her, and, as she knitted, told her one story after another, fairy-tales for the most part, old stories that Madelon knew by heart from her early studies in the German picture-books and similar works. But Jeanne-Marie told them well, and somehow they seemed invested with a new interest for Madelon, as she half unconsciously contrasted her own experiences with those of the heroes and heroines, and found in their adventures some far-fetched parallel to her own. But then their experiences were so much wider and more varied in that old charmed, sunny, fairy life; the knot of their difficulties was so readily cut, by a simple reference to some Fortunatus' purse, or the arrival in the very nick of time of some friendly fairy. Madelon did not draw the parallel quite far enough, or it might have occurred to her that benevolence did not become wholly extinct with the disappearance of fairies, and that friendly interference is not quite unknown even in these more prosaic days. The Fortunatus' purse, it is true, might awake a sense of comparison, but who could have looked at Jeanne-Marie's homely features, and have dreamed of her in connexion with a fairy? In truth, it requires a larger and deeper experience than any that Madelon could have acquired, or reasoned out, to recognise how much of the charm of these tales of our childhood can be traced to the eternal truths that lie hidden in them, or to perceive that the shining fairy concealed beneath the frequent guise of some crabbed old woman, is no mere freak of fancy, but the symbol of a reality, less exceptional perhaps amongst us poor mortals, than amongst the fairies themselves, who, finding their presence no longer needed, vanished from our earth so many centuries ago.

It was the next morning, that, after the doctor's visit was over, Jeanne-Marie returned to the bedroom, with the air of having tidings to impart.

"You will be satisfied now, I hope," she said, as she met the gaze of the restless brown eyes. "M. le Docteur says you may get up for an hour this afternoon."

"Does he?" cried Madelon, eagerly; "then he thinks I am better—that I shall soon be well."

"Of course you are better," said Jeanne-Marie—"you are getting stronger every day; you will soon be quite well again."

"And how soon shall I be able to go out?—to go on a journey, for instance?"

"You are, then, very anxious to get away?" asked Jeanne-Marie.

"But yes," said Madelon naively, "I must go as soon as possible."

"Ah, well," said the woman, stifling a sigh, "that is only natural; but there is no hurry, you will not be able to go yet."

"No," said Madelon, sadly, "I shall not be able to go yet."

She did not remark Jeanne-Marie's sad voice, nor the unwonted tears that filled her eyes; the woman felt half heart-broken at what she imagined to be her charge's indifference. Madelon was not indifferent or ungrateful, but her mind was filled just then with her one idea, and she had no room for any other; it wrought in her what seemed a supreme selfishness, and yet she had no thought of self in the matter.

She lay quite still for a few minutes, her pale little face glowing with her renewed hopes. Then she said,—

"Jeanne-Marie, would you mind putting out my things where I can see them?—my frock and all. Then I shall believe I am to get up."

Jeanne-Marie acquiesced silently. Madelon's scanty wardrobe had all been mended and put in order, and now it was spread out before her; but somehow the sight of the old black silk frock brought a sudden chill with it; the very last time she had put it on had been on the morning of the day she had escaped from the convent. Since then what had she not gone through! what disappointment, terror, sickness nearly to death! Might she not indeed have been dead by this time, or a prisoner for ever within the convent walls, had it not been for Jeanne-Marie? Her eyes filled with tears at the thought. She longed to tell Jeanne-Marie once more how much she loved her; but the woman had left the room, and Madelon could only lie patiently, and think of all she was going to do, when she should be well again.

CHAPTER XV.

A Summer with Jeanne-Marie.

At the back of Jeanne-Marie's house lay the garden, sheltered by the steep rocky hill that rose just beyond. All through the long summer evenings the voices of the men, as they sat smoking and drinking in its vine-covered arbours, might be heard; but during the day it was comparatively deserted, and Jeanne-Marie had no difficulty in finding a quiet, shady corner where Madelon might sit as long as she pleased without being disturbed. An outside wooden staircase led from her room to the garden below, so that she could come and go without passing through the lower rooms of the house; and we may be sure that it was considered a golden day by both her and Jeanne-Marie, when she first made this little expedition. The child, still almost too weak to stand or walk, was carried by her strong, kind hostess down the flight of steps, and once more found herself under the blue heavens, with a world of sweet summer sights and sounds around her, as she lay on her little improvised couch amongst the flowers and sweet-smelling herbs.

"There," said Jeanne-Marie, contemplating her with much satisfaction, "now you have nothing to do but to get well again as fast as you can."

"Ah, I shall soon be well now!" cried Madelon, joyfully. The colour came into her pale cheeks, her eyes shone with a new light. Mists, and rain, and darkness seemed to have fled from her life, and in their place a full tide of summer sunshine, in which the birds sang gladly, and the flowers seemed to spring up and open unconsciously, was crowning and glorifying the day.

That she had nothing to do but to get well, was not at all Madelon's idea, however. A few evenings later, as she lay awake in her bed, watching Jeanne-Marie moving about in the twilight, arranging things for the night, she said,—

"Jeanne-Marie, I want to earn some money."

"Some money, little one! What is that for?"

"Ah, that I cannot tell you; but I want some, very much—thirty francs at least. See here, I have been thinking—I can embroider—Soeur Lucie said I could do it almost as well as she could; do you think you could get me some to do? Ah, please help me. I should like to earn some money."

Two days afterwards, Jeanne-Marie produced two strips of cloth, such as are used for purposes of church decoration, with patterns and materials for embroidery.

"Is that the sort of thing?" she said. "If you could do these, you would get thirty francs for them, I daresay; I will see that they are disposed of."

"I will try," said Madelon. "Jeanne-Marie, how good you are to me!—whatever I want, you do for me!"

"That is nothing," said the woman, and went abruptly away to attend to her customers.

So, all the long summer days, Madelon sat through hot noontides in the shady garden below, through golden sunsets at the open window of her room above, stitching with silks and gold and silver thread, till her weak little fingers ached, and the task seemed as if it would never be done. Down in the homely neglected little garden, all a sweet tangle of flowers and weeds, she would seat herself; the birds would twitter overhead, the bees would come humming round her amongst the unpruned vines and roses that clambered everywhere, while the embroidery pattern slowly grew beneath her fingers. She worked steadily and well, but she could not work very fast; and she wearied, oh! how she wearied of it sometimes; but she never wavered in her purpose. "It is for Monsieur Horace," she would say, and begin again with fresh zeal. Through the open window of the little kitchen, which looked upon the garden, she could see Jeanne-Marie coming and going, chopping herbs, shelling peas and beans; and sometimes, when Madelon was too tired of her work, she would gladly throw it down, that she might help in these employments. "May I make an omelette, Jeanne-Marie?" she would say; "I know how to do it, if you will let me try." And the sight of Madelon flitting about the kitchen, busy among the pots and pans, seemed to stir some long-forgotten emotion in Jeanne-Marie's sad heart—too long-forgotten to be learnt anew without pain, for her eyes would fill with tears as she watched her. The child never went into the village, or, indeed, stirred beyond the garden; that was all the world to her just now, peopled by Jeanne-Marie, her hopes, and her embroidery.

Is it most strange or most natural, one wonders, that there are times when one small nook of earth shuts out, as it were, the whole universe from our eyes, when one personal interest occupies us to the exclusion of the whole world of action, and progress, and speculation, and thought? Thrones may topple over, nationalities be effaced, revolutions in politics, in religion, in science be effected, and all pass unheeded while we sit counting our own private loss and gain in love or friendship, in grief or joy. Whilst Madelon has been wearying out her little heart and brain in the pursuit of her self- imposed task, the world has not been, and is not, standing still, we may be sure, and her small wheel of life is somehow kept in motion by the great revolving circle of events, however little she may think of, or heed them. Sebastopol has fallen in these last months, the Crimean war is at an end, and all the world that was discussing battles and sieges when Horace Graham last parted with Madelon one September afternoon, is talking of treaties and peace now, as the allied armies move homewards from the East. And—which indeed would have had more interest for Madelon could she have known it— Graham himself, after more than two years' hard work, had been wounded in one of the last skirmishes; and with this wound, and the accompanying fever, had lain for weeks very near to death in the Scutari hospital, to be sent home at last, invalided to England. While Madelon had been slowly recovering from her fever in her little out-of-the-world refuge at Le Trooz, Graham had been gaining health and strength in a pleasant English home, with a sister to nurse and pet him, nephews and nieces to make much of him, and the rosiest cheeks and bluest eyes in the world to fall in love with, as he lay idly on the lawn through the summer days. It was at the house of his sister, who was married to a country doctor in Kent, that this double process of love-making and convalescence went on, with the greatest success and satisfaction to all parties; and it was Miss Maria Leslie, the ward of his brother-in-law, Dr. Vavasour, who was the owner of those bluest eyes and rosiest cheeks.

Meanwhile Madelon, stitching, stitching away at her work, thought vaguely of Monsieur Horace as being still in that far- off country from which he had last written to her, and wondered a little how soon a letter written to the English address he had given her would reach him. What would he say and think when he received it? And when, ah! when would she be able to write it? She worked on steadily, and yet it was already September when the last stitch was put in, and she could give the work to Jeanne-Marie. A few days afterwards the woman put thirty francs into her hands.

"There is your money," she said; "now what are you going to do with it?"

"I am going away," answered Madelon.

"Yes?" said Jeanne-Marie, without any apparent emotion, "and where are you going?"

"I am going to Spa. Ah! Jeanne-Marie, do not ask me what I am going to do; it is my secret, I cannot tell any one, but you shall know some day."

Jeanne-Marie was silent for a moment, then, "Look here, ma petite," she said; "I don't want to know what you are going to do; it is no concern of mine, and I cannot keep you if you want to go away; but who are you going to in Spa? I cannot let you go off without knowing where you are, and whether you are safe. You might have the fever again, or some one might try to take you back to the convent, and I should know nothing about it. Where are you going? Have you any friends at Spa?"

"There is only Madame Bertrand at the Hotel de Madrid," replied Madelon, rather disconsolately; "I would not mind going to her again, she is so kind; she wanted me to stay with her the last time I was there—but then there is Mademoiselle Henriette—it was she who wished to send me back to the convent; if she were not there, I should not be afraid."

"And is there no other hotel you could go to?"

"I should not like to go to another," said Madelon, "they would be all strange; I would rather go to Madame Bertrand, and I should not have to stay there long."

"And then what are you going to do?"

"I don't know—I am not sure," answered Madelon, rather embarrassed. "I shall write to a friend I have—Monsieur Horace, you know—and he will tell me what to do."

"And why do you not write to him at once, mon enfant?"

"I cannot," was all Madelon's answer, nor could Jeanne-Marie ever extract any further explanation on that point. The next day Jeanne-Marie was missing from the restaurant for some hours; but she reappeared in the afternoon, and presently came out into the garden, where Madelon, seated in her favourite corner, was nursing a big cat, and sorting out herbs for drying.

"What a long time you have been away!" she said, as Jeanne- Marie came up to her. "See, I have done all these; I think there are enough to last you all the winter."

"Not quite," answered the woman; "bur never mind them now. Do you want to know where I have been? I have been to Spa, and seen Madame Bertrand."

"Have you?" cried Madelon; "did you tell her about me? Was Mademoiselle Henriette there?"

"Mademoiselle Henriette is gone; she and her aunt had a grand quarrel, and she left, and so Madame Bertrand is alone again. I told her all about you: she said she was glad you had not gone back to the convent, and that you could go to her whenever you wished, for she would take care of you. So as your work is done," Jeanne-Marie added with a sigh, "there is nothing to keep you, and you may go as soon as you like."

"May I" cried Madelon; "to-morrow, next day? Ah! Jeanne-Marie, how happy you have made me; you will know why, you will understand some day—tell me when I shall go."

"We will say the day after to-morrow. I will get your things ready," answered Jeanne-Marie. She stood gazing at the child for a moment, as if she would have said something more, then turned away quickly and entered the house.

Madelon never thought of connecting Jeanne-Marie's sad looks and ways with her own departure; and indeed, hardly noticed them, in her joy at having accomplished her task, and earned the longed-for thirty francs. She did not understand nor suspect the woman's passionate longing for her affection; no child can comprehend that strange, pathetic yearning that older people have for a child's love—a love so pure, and fresh, and ingenuous, that when it is freely and frankly given, it is surely the most flattering and precious in the world. Madelon gave Jeanne-Marie all the love she had to bestow, but the first place in her heart was already taken; and perhaps the woman had discovered that it was so, and was half jealous of this unknown Monsieur Horace, whom she divined to be at the bottom of all Madelon's plans and ideas. But if it were so, she never spoke of it, nor of any of the half- formed hopes and projects she may have had; and Madelon never could have guessed them, as her kind, sad hostess silently made up her small wardrobe into a bundle, and patched the old black silk frock once more, sighing over it the while. And had Madelon then no regrets at leaving the little cottage, where she had been tended with such motherly care? Some, perhaps; for as she sat that last evening watching Jeanne-Marie at her work, she, too, sighed a little; and at last, clasping her arms round the woman's neck, she cried, "Jeanne-Marie, I will love you always—always!—I will never forget you!"

"That is as may be," says melancholy Jeanne-Marie, disengaging herself.

"Ah! you will not believe me," said Madelon; "but I tell you I never forget, and you have been so good, so kind to me! Sometimes I think I should like to stay with you always—would you let me?"

"Would I let you?" said Jeanne-Marie, dropping her work suddenly, and looking at the child. "No, I would not let you," she said, after a moment's pause, "unless you had nowhere else to go; but you have other friends, it appears, and it is well for you. No, I would not let you, for it would be as bad a thing for you as could be. Ask any of the neighbours what they would think of it—ask them if they think you would get good or bad from me, and see what they would say!" She gave a little scornful laugh.

"I don't know what you mean," said Madelon, fixing her great eyes on her with a puzzled look—"I don't care what they would say. You are one of the best people I ever knew, and I love you with all my heart; but I must go away."

"Why must you?" asks Jeanne-Marie, stitching away at the black frock.

"That is what I cannot tell you," said Madelon. "No, I will not tell any one, though I should like to tell you, too," added the poor child, gazing wistfully at almost the only friend she had in the world.

"Well, well," said Jeanne-Marie, "I do not want to hear your secrets, as you know, unless you like to tell them; but I am not going to lose sight of you altogether till I hear you are safe with your friends. You must write me a letter from Spa, and if I do not hear or see anything of you in a week's time, I shall come and look after you."

"Yes, I will write," said Madelon; "and I wish—I wish I was not going away; I have been so happy here." And then she hid her face on Jeanne-Marie's shoulder, while the sky was all rosy with the sunset of the last of these peaceful summer days that our Madelon was to spend at Le Trooz.

Jeanne-Marie could not spare time to go again to Spa the next day, but she went with Madelon to the station, and waited till the train that bore her away was out of sight, and then, all lonely, she walked back to her empty house.

CHAPTER XVI.

How Madelon kept her Promise.

Madelon was standing in a little upper bedroom of the Hotel de Madrid, a room so high up that from the window one looked over the tops of the trees in the Place Royale below, to the opposite hills. It was already dusk, but there was sufficient light to enable her to count over the little piles of gold that lay on the table before her, and which, as she counted, she put into a small canvas bag. It was the third evening after her arrival in Spa; she was preparing for her third visit to the Redoute, and this was what her capital of thirty francs had already produced.

The last ten-franc piece disappeared within the bag, and Madelon, taking her hat and cloak, began to put them on slowly, pausing as she did so to reflect.

"If I have the same luck this evening," she thinks, "to-morrow I shall be able to write to Monsieur Horace—if only I have—and why not? I have scarcely lost once these last two nights. Certainly it is better to play in the evening than in the daytime. I remember now that papa once said so, and to-night I feel certain—yes, I feel certain that I shall win—and then to- morrow——"

She clasped her hands in ecstasy; she looked up at the evening sky. It was a raw, grey September evening, with gusts of wind and showers of rain at intervals. But Madelon cared nothing for the weather; her heart was all glowing with hope, and joy, and exultation. She put on her hat and veil, took up her money, and locking her door after her, ran downstairs. She hung the key up in Madame Bertrand's room, but Madame Bertrand was not there. On Madelon's arrival at the hotel she had found the excellent old woman ill, and unable to leave her room, and it was in her bed that she had given the child the warmest of welcomes, and from thence that she had issued various orders for her comfort and welfare. Her attack still kept her confined to her room, and thus it happened that our Madelon, quite independent, found herself at liberty to come and go just as she pleased.

She hung up her key, in the deserted little parlour, and, unchallenged, left the hotel, and went out into the tree- planted Place, where the band was playing, and people walking up and down under the chill grey skies. She felt very hopeful and joyous, so different from the first time she had started on the same errand, and the fact inspired her with ever- increasing confidence. She had failed then, and yet here she was, successful in her last attempts, ready to make another crowning trial, and with how many more chances in her favour! Surely she could not fail now!—and yet if she should! She was turning towards the Redoute, when an idea suddenly occurred to her—an idea most natural, arising, as it did, from that instinctive cry for more than human help, that awakes in every heart on great emergencies, and appealing, moreover, to that particular class of religious sentiment which in our little orphaned Madelon had most readily responded to convent teaching. What if it had been the Holy Virgin Mother who had been her protector in all these troubles, who had raised her up friends, and had brought her from death, as it were, to life again, to fulfil her promise? And if it were so,—which seemed most probable to Madelon,—would it not be well to invite her further protection, and even by some small offering to give emphasis to her prayers? Madelon's notions, it will be perceived, were not in strict accordance with convent orthodoxy, which would scarcely have been willing to recognize the Virgin's help in a successful escape from the convent itself; but orthodox notions were the last things with which it was to be expected our Madelon would trouble herself. Without other thought than that here might be another and sure way of furthering her one object, she made her way into a church, and expending two sous in a lighted taper, carried it to a little side chapel, where, above a flower-decorated altar, a beneficent Madonna seemed to welcome all sad orphans in the world to her all-protecting embrace.

To me there is something infinitely touching in these shrines to the Virgin, with all their associations of suffering and prayer, in their little ex-voto pictures, and flowers, and lighted tapers. I do not envy those who can see in them nothing but the expression of a pitiable superstition; to my mind they appeal to far wider sympathies, as one thinks of the sick and weary hearts who have come there to seek consolation and help. Everywhere one comes across these shrines—in the gloom of some great Cathedral, in some homely village church, in some humble wayside chapel, where, amidst sunny fields and pastures, amidst mountains, streams, and lakes, one reads the little heart-broken scrawls affixed to the grating, praying an Ave-Maria or Paternoster from the passer-by, for a sick person, for a mother watching beside her dying child, for a woman forsaken of the world. A whole atmosphere of consecrated suffering seems to float round these spots sacred to sorrow, the sorrow that humbly appeals, as it best knows how, to the love, wide enough to embrace and comfort all desolate, and yearning, and heavy-laden souls.

One can fancy Madelon as she walks along the dim church; one or two lights twinkle here and there in the darkness, the taper she holds shines on her little pale face, and her brown eyes are lighted up with a sudden glow of enthusiasm, devotion, supplication, as she kneels for a moment before the Virgin's altar, with an Ave-Maria on her lips, and an unspoken prayer in her heart.

Half an hour later, Madelon, in the midst of the blaze of light in the big gambling salon of the Redoute, is thinking of nothing in the world but rouge-et-noir and the chances of the game before her. For the first time she has ventured to push her way through the crowd and take a seat at the table; and for the moment she has forgotten her object, forgotten why she is there even, in the excitement of watching whether black or red will win. It matters little, it seems; whatever she stakes on, comes up; her small capital is being doubled an trebled. She had taken off her veil, which hitherto she had carefully kept down, and the little flushed face, with the eager eyes that sparkle with impatience at every pause in the game, is noticed by several people round the table. Her invariable luck, too, is remarked upon. "Stake for me, mon enfant," whispered a voice in her ear, and a little pile of five-franc pieces was put in front of her. Madelon, hardly thinking of what she did, staked the stranger's money along with her own on the red. It won. "Thank you, my child; it is the first time I have won to-night," said the voice again, as a long hand covered with rings swept up the money. Madelon turned round quickly: behind her stood a woman with rouged cheeks, a low evening dress half concealed by a black lace shawl, beads and bracelets on her neck and arms—a common figure enough—there were half-a-dozen more such in the room—and she took no more notice of Madelon, but went on pricking her card without speaking to her again. But to the child there came a quick revulsion of feeling, that she could not have explained, as she shrank away from her gaudily-attired neighbour. All at once the game seemed somehow to have lost its interest and excitement; the crowds, the heat, the light, suddenly oppressed her; for the first time her heart gave way. She felt scared, friendless, lonely. There came to her mind a thought of the peaceful faces of the black-robed sisters, a sound as of the tinkling bell ringing above the old cabbage-ground, a breath sweet with the scent of fresh roses in Jeanne-Marie's little garden; she had a momentary impulse to go, to fly somewhere, anywhere—ah! but whither? Whither in all the wide world could she go? Back to the convent to be made a nun? Back to Jeanne-Marie with her promise unfulfilled? "I will keep my promise, I will not be frightened," thinks the poor child, bravely; "I will fancy that papa is in the room, and that he will take care of me." And all these thoughts pass through he head while the croupier is crying, "Faites votre jeu, Messieurs, faites votre jeu!" and in, and on she goes again.

And while she is intent on making Monsieur Horace's fortune, Monsieur Horace himself, not five hundred yards off, is walking up and down the Place Royale, listening to the band, and troubling his head not at all about fortune-making, but very much about Madelon. On his recovery from his illness, he had come to Spa to drink the waters, and had been there nearly a month, during which time he had twice been over to Liege to make inquiries about Madelon. His dismay had been great, when, on his first visit to the convent, he had learnt that Mademoiselle Linders was dead, that her little niece had disappeared three or four months before, and that nothing had been heard of her since, with the exception of the vague, anonymous letter from Paris. He wrote off at once to Madame Lavaux, the only person with whom he could imagine Madeleine to have taken refuge; but, as we know, Madame Lavaux had neither seen her nor heard anything about her. He had then, in his perplexity, written to her old friends in Florence, thinking it just possible they might be able to give him some information, but with no more success. He received an answer from the American artist, in which he mentioned the death of the old violinist, lamented Madelon's disappearance, but, as may be supposed, gave no news of her.

Graham was greatly annoyed and perplexed. What could have become of the child? To whom could she have gone? She had had no friend but himself when he had last parted from her, and she could hardly, he imagined, have made any outside the convent walls. And why had she run away? Had she been unkindly treated? Why had she not written to him if she were in trouble? These and a hundred other questions he asked himself, reproaching himself the while for not having kept up some kind of communication with her, or with Mademoiselle Linders. He had a real interest in, and affection for, the child, whom he had befriended in her hour of need; and held himself besides in some sort responsible for her welfare, after the promise he had made to her father on his death-bed. What was he to do if all traces of her were indeed lost? This very day he had again been over to Liege, had paid a second visit to the convent, and had made inquiries of every person who probably or improbably might have had news of her, but with no more result than before; and now, as he walked up and down the Place Royale, he was debating in his own mind whether he could take any further steps in the matter, or whether it must not rather now be left to time and chance to discover her hiding-place.

A shower of rain came on, dispersing the few people who had cared to linger in the open air in this raw, chilly evening; and Horace, leaving the Place, went up the street, which, with its lights and shops, looked cheerfully by comparison, and, like the rest of the world, turned into the Redoute, more than usually full, for it was the race-week, and numbers of strangers had come into the town. The ball-room, where dancing was going on, was crowded; and Graham, who, attracted by the music, had looked in, had soon had enough of the heat and noise. In a few minutes he had made his way into the gambling salon, and had joined one of the silent groups standing round the tables.

Meanwhile, Madelon, once more absorbed in the game, is meditating her grand coup. Hitherto she has been playing cautiously, her capital accumulating gradually, but surely, till she has quite a heap of gold and notes before her. It is already a fortune in her eyes, and she thinks, if she could only double this all at once, then indeed would the great task be accomplished; she might go then, she might write to Monsieur Horace, she would see him again—ah! what joy, what happiness! Should she venture? Surely it would be very rash to risk all that at once—and yet if she were to win—and she has been so lucky this evening— her heart leaps up again—she hesitates a moment, then pushes the whole on to the black, reserving only one ten-franc piece, and sits pale, breathless, incapable of moving, during what seemed to her the longest minute in her life. It was only a minute—the croupier dealt the cards—"Rouge perd, et couleur," he cried, paid the smaller stakes, and then, counting out gold and notes, pushed over to her what was, in fact, a sufficiently large sum, and which, to her inexperienced eyes, seemed enormous. "Who is she?" asked one or two of the bystanders of each other. "She has been winning all the evening." They shrugged their shoulders; nobody knew. As for Madelon, she heard none of their remarks— she had won, she might go now, go and find Monsieur Horace; and as this thought crossed her mind, she gathered up her winnings, thrust them into her bag, and rose to depart. As she turned round, she faced Monsieur Horace himself, who had been standing behind her chair, little dreaming whose play it was he had been watching.

She recognised him in a moment, though he had grown thinner and browner since she had last seen him. "Monsieur Horace!— Monsieur Horace!" she cried.

He was still watching the game, but turned at the sound of her voice, and looked down on the excited little face before him. "Madelon!" he exclaimed—"Madelon here!—no, impossible! Madelon!"

"Yes, yes," she said, half laughing, half crying at the same time, "I am Madelon. Ah! come this way—let me show you. I have something to show you this time—you will see, you will see!"

She seized both his hands as she spoke, and pulled him through the crowd into the adjoining reading-room. It was all lighted up, the table strewn with books and papers; but no one was there. Madelon was in a state of wild excitement and triumph.

"Look here," she cried; "I promised to make your fortune, did I not, Monsieur Horace?—and I have done it! Ah! you will be rich now—see here!" she poured the contents of her bag on the table before him. "Are you glad?" she said.

"Glad!—what on earth are you talking about? Where did you get this money, Madelon?"

"Where?—why, there, at the tables, to be sure—where else?" she answered, getting frightened at his manner.

"But—gracious powers! are you out of your senses, child?" cried Graham. "Whatever possessed you to come here? What business have you in a place like this? Are you alone?"

"Yes, I am alone. I came to make your fortune," answered Madelon, dismayed.

"My fortune!" he repeated. "What can have put such a notion into your head? As for that money, the sooner you get rid of it the better. What the devil—good heavens! a baby like you!— here, give it to me!"

"What are you going to do?" cried Madelon, struck with sudden fear, as he swept it up in his hand.

"Take it back, of course," he answered, striding into the next room.

"Ah! you shall not!" she cried passionately, running after him, and seizing his hand; "it is mine, it is mine, you shall not have it!"

"Hush, Madelon," he said, turning round sharply, "don't make a disturbance here."

She made no answer, but clung with her whole weight to his arm as he approached the table. She dragged his hand back, she held it tight between hers; her face was quite pale, her teeth set in her childish passion.

"Madelon, let go!" said Graham; "do you hear what I say? Let go!"

"Give me my money back!" she cried, in a passionate whisper; "you have no right to take it; it is my own."

"Let go," he repeated, freeing his hand as he spoke. She seized it again, but it was too late; he had placed the money on the table, and with the other hand pushed it into the middle. A horrible pause, while Madelon clung tighter and tighter, watching breathlessly till she saw the croupier rake in the whole. All was lost, then; she flung Horace's hand away, and rushed out of the room. "Madelon!" he cried, and followed her. Down the lighted staircase, out into the lighted street, he could see the swift little figure darting along the Place Royale, where he had been walking not half an hour ago, all quiet and dark now; the music gone, the people dispersed, the rain falling heavily. Still she ran on, into the avenue of the Promenade a Sept Heures. It was darker still there, only a rare lamp slanting here and there a long gleam of light across the wet path. Horace began to be afraid that he should lose her altogether, but she suddenly stumbled and fell, and when he came up to her, she was sitting all in a heap on the ground at the foot of a tree, her face buried in her hands, her frame shaking with sobs.

"Madelon," said Horace, stooping down, and trying to take her hands; "my little Madelon, my poor little child!"

She jumped up when she heard his voice, and started away from him.

"Ne me touchez pas, je vous le defends," she cried, "ne me touchez pas, je vous deteste—vous etes un cruel—un perfide!"

She began to sob again, and dropped down once more upon the ground, crouched upon the damp earth, strewn with dead fallen leaves. Her hat had fallen off, and the rain came down upon her uncovered head, wetting the short hair as it was blown about by the wind, drenching her thin little cloak and old black silk frock. A very pitiful sight as she sat there, a desolate, homeless child, on this dark, wet autumn night, deaf in her excess of childish rage to Horace's words, shaking him off with wilful, passionate gestures whenever he touched her—a very perplexing sight to the young man, who stood and watched her, uncertain what to say or do next.

At last she grew a little quieter, and then he spoke to her in a tone of authority:—

"You must get up, Madelon; you will get quite wet if you stay here."

He took hold of her hand, and held it firmly when she tried to loosen it, and at last she got up slowly. As she rose, she became conscious of the wet and cold, and was completely sobered as she stood shivering at Horace's side.

"My poor little Madelon!" he said, in the kind voice she remembered from old times. "You are quite wet and so cold, we must not stay here; tell me where you are going?"

"I don't know," said Madelon, beginning to cry again. Only an hour ago she had been so full of joy and hope, with such a bright future before her; and now the rain and wind were beating in her face, above her the black sky, darkness all around; where indeed was she going?

"But you have some friends here?" said Horace—"you are not staying here all alone?"

"Yes, I am all alone," said Madelon, sobbing. "Oh! what shall I do?—what shall I do?"

"Don't cry so, Madelon," said Graham, "my poor child, don't be frightened. I will take care of you, but I want you to tell me all about this. Do you mean you are all alone in Spa?"

"Yes, I am all alone; I came here three days ago. I had been ill at Le Trooz, and a woman there—Jeanne-Marie—took care of me; but as soon as I was well and had money enough, I came to Spa, and went to the Hotel de Madrid. Papa and I used to go there, and I knew Madame Bertrand who keeps it."

"So you slept there last night," said Horace, not a little mystified at the story, but trying to elucidate some fact sufficiently plain to act upon.

"Yes, last light, and before. I left my things there, and meant to have gone back to-night, but I have no money now. What is to be done?" That grand question of money, so incomprehensible to children to whom all things seem to come by nature, had long ago been faced by Madelon, but had never before, perhaps, presented itself as a problem so incapable of solution—as a question to be asked of such a very dreary, black, voiceless world, from which no answer could reasonably be expected. But, in truth, the answer was not far off.

"I will take care of all that," said Horace; "so now, come with me. Stay, here is your hat; we must not go without that."

He arranged her disordered hair and crushed hat, and then, taking her hand, led her back towards the town, Madelon very subdued, and miserable, and cold, Horace greatly perplexed as to the meaning of it all, but quite resolved not to lose sight of his charge any more.

Arrived at the Hotel de Madrid, he left Madelon for a moment in the shabby little coffee-room, while he asked to speak to Madame Bertrand. Madame Bertrand, as we know, was ill and in bed, but the maid brought down Madelon's bundle of things. Graham asked her a few questions, but the girl evidently knew nothing about the child. "Madame knew—she had dined in Madame's private room the last two days," but she could not tell anything more about her, and did not even know her name.

When Graham came back to the room, he found Madelon standing listlessly as he had left her; she had not moved. "Well," he said cheerily, "that is settled; now you are my property for the present; you shall sleep at my hotel to-night."

"At your hotel?" she said, looking up at him.

"Yes, where I am staying. Your friend here is not well. I think I shall look after you better. You do not mind coming with me?"

"No, no!" she cried, beginning to cling to him in her old way— "I will go anywhere with you. Indeed I did not mean what I said, but I am very unhappy."

"You are tired and wet," answered Graham, "but we will soon set that to rights; you will see to-morrow, you will not be unhappy at all. Old friends like you and me, Madelon, should not cry at seeing each other again; should they?"

Talking to her in his kind, cheerful way, they walked briskly along till they arrived at the hotel. Madelon was tired out, and he at once ordered a room, fire, and supper for her, and handed her over to the care of a good-natured chambermaid.

"Good night, Madelon. I will come and see after you to-morrow morning," he said smiling, as he left her.

She looked up at him for a moment with a most pitiful, eager longing in her eyes; then suddenly seizing his hands in her wild excited way—"Oh, Monsieur Horace, Monsieur Horace, if I could only tell you!" she cried; and then, as he left the room, and closed the door, she flung herself upon the floor in quite another passion of tears than that she had given way to in the Promenade a Sept Heures.

CHAPTER XVII.

The old Letter.

When Horace went to see after Madelon the next morning, he found her already up and dressed. She opened her bedroom door in answer to his knock, and stood before him, her eyes cast down, her wavy hair all smooth and shining, even the old black silk frock arranged and neat—a very different little Madelon from the passionate, despairing, weeping child of the evening before.

"Good morning, Madelon," said Graham, taking her hand and looking at her with a smile and a gleam in his kind eyes; "how are you to-day? Did you sleep well?"

"I am very well, Monsieur," says Madelon, with her downcast eyes. "I have been up a long time. I have been thinking of what I shall do; I do not know, will you help me?"

"We will talk of that presently," said Graham, "but first we must have some breakfast; come downstairs with me now."

"Monsieur Horace," said Madelon, drawing back, "please I wanted to tell you, I know I was very naughty last night, and I am very sorry;" and she looked up with her eyes full of tears.

"I don't think we either of us quite knew what we were doing last night," said Graham, squeezing her little hand in his; "let us agree to forget it, for the present at all events; I want you to come with me now; there is a lady downstairs who very much wishes to see you."

"To see me?" said Madelon, shrinking back again.

"Yes, don't be frightened, it is only my aunt. She wants to know you, and I think will be very fond of you. Will you come with me?" And then, as they went along the passage and downstairs, he explained to her that he was not alone at the hotel, but that his aunt, Mrs. Treherne, was also there, and that he had been telling her what old friends he and Madelon were, and how unexpectedly they had met last night.

He opened the door of a sitting-room on the premier; a wood- fire was crackling, breakfast was on the table, and before the coffee-pot stood a lady dressed in black.

"Here is Madelon, Aunt Barbara," said Graham; and Mrs. Treherne came forward, a tall, gracious, fair woman, with stately manners, and a beautiful sad face.

"My dear," she said, taking Madelon's hand, "Horace has been telling me about you, and from what he says, I think you and I must become better acquainted. He tells me your name is Madeleine Linders."

"Yes, Madame," says Madelon, rather shyly, and glancing up at the beautiful face, which, with blue eyes and golden hair still undimmed, might have been that of some fair saint or Madonna, but for a certain chilling expression of cold sadness.

"I knew something of a Monsieur Linders once," said Mrs. Treherne, "and I think he must have been your father, my dear. Your mother was English, was she not? Can you tell me what her name was before she married?"

"I—I don't know," said Madelon; "she died when I was quite a baby."

"Nearly thirteen years ago, that would be? Yes, that is as I thought; but have you never heard her English name, never seen it written? Have you nothing that once belonged to her?"

"Yes, Madame," answered Madelon; "there is a box at the convent that was full of things, clothes, and some books. There was a name written in them—ah! I cannot remember it—it was English."

"Moore?" asked Mrs. Treherne. "Stay, I will write it. Magdalen Moore—was that it?"

"Yes," said Madelon; "I think it was—yes, I know it was. I remember the letters now. But I have something of hers here, too," she added—"a letter, that I found in the pocket of this dress—this was mamma's once, and it was in the trunk. Shall I fetch it?—it is upstairs."

"Yes, I should like to see it, my dear. You will wonder at all these questions, but, if I am not mistaken, your mother was a very dear friend of mine."

Madelon left the room, and Mrs. Treherne, sitting down at the table, began to arrange her breakfast-cups. Horace was standing with one arm on the mantel-piece, gazing into the fire; he had been silent during this short interview, but as Madelon disappeared,—

"Is she at all like her mother?" he inquired.

"She is like—yes, certainly she is like; her eyes remind me of Magdalen's—and yet she is unlike, too."

"You must be prepared," said Horace, after a moment's pause, "to find her devoted to her father's memory; and not without reason, I must say, for he was devoted to her, after his own fashion. She thinks him absolute perfection; and, in fact, I believe this escapade of hers to have been entirely founded on precedents furnished by him."

"I think it is the most dreadful thing I ever heard of," said Mrs. Treherne—"a child of that age alone in such a place!"

"Well, I really don't know," answered Graham, half laughing. "I don't suppose it has done her much mischief; and of this I am quite sure, that she had no idea of there being any more harm in going to a gambling-table than in going for a walk."

"That appears to me the worst part of it, that a child should have been brought up in such ignorance of right and wrong. However, she can be taught differently."

"Certainly; but don't you think the teaching had better come gradually?—it would break her heart, to begin with, to be told her father was not everything she imagines—if indeed she could be made to understand it just yet, which I doubt."

"Of course it would be cruel to shake a child's faith in her father," answered Mrs. Treherne; "but she must learn it in time. Monsieur Linders was one of the most worthless men that ever lived, and Charles Moore was as bad, if not worse. I wonder—good heavens, Horace, how one wonders at such things!—I wonder what Magdalen had done that she should be left to the mercy of two such men as those."

"Well, it is no fault of Madelon's, at any rate," Horace began; and then stopped, as the door opened, and Madelon came in. In her hand she carried a queer little bundle of treasures, that she had brought away with her from the convent—the old German's letter, the two that Horace had sent her, and one or two other things, all tied together with a silk thread.