Outside, the night had settled heavily, and without the small lantern which Mlle Ange produced from under her cloak, it would have been impossible to see the path. A little breeze had risen and seemed to follow them, moaning among the leafless boughs, and rustling the dead leaves below. They walked in silence, each with a hand on the heavy basket. It was very cold, and yet oppressive, as if snow were about to fall or a storm to break. Mlle Ange led the way up a bridle-path, and when the grey pile of the château loomed before them she turned sharply to the left, and Aline felt her hand taken. "This way," whispered Ange; and they stumbled up a broken step or two, and passed through a long, shattered window. "This way," said Ange again. "Mon Dieu, how long since I came here! Ah, mon Dieu!" The empty room echoed to their steps and to that low-voiced exclamation, and the lantern light fell waveringly upon the shadows, driving them into the corners, where they crowded like ghosts out of that past of which the room seemed full. It was a small room, and had been exquisite. Here and there a moulded cupid still smiled its dimpled smile, and clutched with plump, engaging fingers at the falling garland of white, heavy-bloomed roses which served it for girdle and plaything. In one corner a tattered rag of brocade still showed that the hangings had been green. Ange looked round mournfully. "It was Madame’s boudoir," she said slowly, with pauses between the sentences. "Madame sat here, by the window, because she liked to look out at the terrace, and the garden her Italian mother had made. Madame was beautiful then—like a picture, though her hair was too white to need powder. She had little hands, soft like a child’s hands; but her eyes looked through you, and at once you thought of all the bad things you had ever done or thought. It was worse than confession, for there was no absolution afterwards." She paused and moved a step or two. "I sat here. The hours I have read to her, or worked whilst she was busy with her letters!" "You!" said Aline, surprised. "Yes, I, her godchild, and a pet until—come then, child, until I forgot I was on the same footing as cat or dog, petted for their looks, and presumed to find a common humanity in myself and her. Ah, Marraine, it was you who made me a Republican. Oh, my child, pride is an evil god to serve! Don’t sacrifice your life to him as mine was sacrificed."