“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