Produced by ellinora, Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries) +-------------------------------------------------+ |Transcriber's note: | | | |Obvious typographic errors have been corrected. | | | +-------------------------------------------------+ _A Sheaf of Bluebells_ _By Baroness Orczy, Author of "The Scarlet Pimpernel," "The Elusive Pimpernel," etc._ [Illustration: Decoration] _TORONTO: WILLIAM BRIGGS 1917_ _Printed in Great Britain_ CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE I.--THE MASTERS OF FRANCE 1 II.--THE RETURN OF THE NATIVES 11 III.--THE HERMITS OF LA VIEUVILLE 27 IV.--KINDRED 42 V.--THE SPRINGTIME OF THE YEAR 59 VI.--THE LEGEND OF ST. FRONT 73 VII.--THE SILENT POOL 78 VIII.--THE GENERAL 101 IX.--THE COOING OF THE PIGEONS 117 X.--THE FOUNDRIES OF LA FRONTENAY 126 XI.--THE FIRST TRICK 143 XII.--A FOOL AND HIS FOLLY 157 XIII.--AFTER A YEAR 174 XIV.--THE TOOL 188 XV.--A NOTE OF WARNING 196 XVI.--THE IRREPARABLE 212 XVII.--A LAST APPEAL 227 XVIII.--THE WORD OF THE MASTER 239 XIX.--THE PARTING OF THE WAYS 254 XX.--THE STRAW 265 XXI.--THE CRASH OF THE STORM 279 XXII.--HEAVEN AND EARTH 296 XXIII.--AN HOUR'S FOLLY 311 XXIV.--AFTER THE STORM 324 XXV.--THE WHITE PIGEON 344 A SHEAF OF BLUEBELLS CHAPTER I THE MASTERS OF FRANCE I Among the many petitions presented that year by emigres desirous of returning to France under the conditional amnesty granted to them by the newly-crowned Emperor, was one signed by Mme. la Marquise de Mortain and by her son Laurent, then aged twenty-one years, and one signed by M. le Comte de Courson for himself and his daughter Fernande. Gaillard says in his memoirs of Fouche that the latter was greatly averse to the petition being granted; but that Napoleon, then on the point of starting for his campaign in Prussia, was inclined to leniency in this matter--leniency which roused the ire and contempt of the Minister of Police--the man who, of a truth, and above the Emperor himself, was virtual dictator of France these days.