"It is a long story," began Father Rameau, gently, "a strange one, too. Through the courage and craftiness of a Miami squaw, who had been a sort of maid to Madame Angelot, she escaped death. They hid in the woods and subsisted on anything they could find until Madame could go no farther. She thought herself dying, and implored the woman to take her babe to Detroit and find its father, and she lay down in a leafy covert to die. In that hour she repented bitterly of her course in leaving the convent and listening to a forbidden love. She prayed God to believe if it were to do over again she would hearken to the voice of the Church, and hoped this fervent repentance would be remembered in her behalf. Then she resigned herself to death. But in the providence of the good All Father she was rescued by another party and taken to a farmhouse not far distant. Here were two devoted women who were going to Montreal to enter the convent, and were to embark at a point on Lake Ontario, where a boat going North would touch. They nursed her for several weeks before she was able to travel, and then she decided to cast in her lot with them. Her husband, no doubt, had the child. She was dead to the world. She belonged henceforward to the Church and to the service of God. Moreover, it was what she desired. She had tried worldly love and her own will, and been unhappy in it. Monsieur, she was born for a devotee. It was a sad mistake when she yielded to your persuasions. Her parents had destined her for the convent, and she had a double debt to pay. The marriage was unlawful and she was absolved from it." "Then I was free also. It cannot bind on one side and loose on the other. I believe you have said rightly. She was not happy, though I think even now she will tell you that I did all in my power. I did not oppose her going back to her first faith, although then I would have fought against this disruption of the marriage tie." "It was no marriage in God's sight, with a heretic," interposed Father Gilbert. "She repented her waywardness bitterly. God made her to see it through sore trial. But the child is hers." "Not when you admit that she sent it to me, gave me the right," was the confident reply. He pressed Jeanne closer and with a strength that said, "I will fight for you." The proud dignity of his carriage, the resolution in his face, indicated that he would not be an easy enemy to combat. There was a strange silence, as if no one could tell what would be the next move. He broke it, however. "The child shall decide," he said. "She shall hear her mother's story, and then mine. She shall select with whom she will spend the coming years. God knows I should have been glad enough to have had her then. By what sad mistake fate should have traversed the mother's wishes, and given her these wasted years, I cannot divine."