Above the scudding clouds was a moon that pulsed a weak intermittent radiance through the worn places of the drift. Its light was always more suggested than revealed; but it was sufficient to denote that the apparition was that of a very pale young woman--a simple child she looked, whose eyes, nevertheless, wore that common expression of the dramatic intensity of her times. She stood an instant, tense as Corday, her fingers bent to her lips; her background a frouzy wall with the legend _Propriété Nationale_ scrawled on it in white chalk. Significant to the inference, the cap of scarlet wool was drawn down upon her young _blondes_ curls--the gold of the coveted perukes. Suddenly she made a little movement, and in the same instant gave out a whistle clear and soft. Yes, it was she from whom it proceeded; and I shuddered. There below me in the ditch were the dogs; here before me was this fearless child. For myself, even in the presence of this angel, I dared scarcely stir. It was unnatural; it was preposterous--came a scramble and a rush; and there, issued from the filthy sewer, was a huge boar-hound, that fawned on the little citoyenne, and yelped (under her breath) like a thing of human understanding. She cried softly, “Down, Radegonde!” and patted the monster’s head with a pretty manner of endearment. “Ah!” she murmured, “hast thou broken thy faith with thy hunger? Traitor!--but I will ask no questions. Here are thy comfits. My sweet, remember thy pedigree and thy mistress.” She thrust a handful of sugar-plums into the great jaws. I could hear the hound crunching them in her teeth. What was I to do?--what warning to give? This child--this frail wind-flower of the night--the guillotine would have devoured her at a snap, and laughed over the tit-bit! But I, and the nameless gluttons of the ditch! They were there--part at least of one of those packs (recruited by gradual degrees from the desolated homes of the proscribed--of _émigrés_) that now were swollen to such formidable proportions as to have become a menace and a nightly terror. The dogs were there, and should they scent this tender quarry, what power was in a single faithful hound to defend her against a half hundred, perhaps, of her fellows. Sweating with apprehension, I stole down the steps. She was even then preparing to retreat hurriedly as she had come. Her lips were pressed to the beast’s wrinkled head. The sound of her footstep might have precipitated the catastrophe I dreaded. “Citoyenne! citoyenne!” I whispered in an anguished voice. She looked up, scared and white in a moment. The dog gave a rolling growl. “Radegonde!” she murmured, in a faint warning tone. The brute stood alert, her hair bristling. “Bid her away!” I entreated. “You are in danger.” She neither answered nor moved. “See, I am in earnest!” I cried, loud as I durst. “The wild dogs are below there.” “Radegonde!” she murmured again.