There all was excitement and apprehension; they were seeking her everywhere, and calling her name. Dame Perrine was shrieking at the top of her voice, and the provost, who had been sent for in hot haste, was trying to lay hold upon something, in the midst of the good woman's lamentations, which might put him on the track of the absent one, who was in all probability a fugitive. "Look you, Dame Perrine; do you say that you last saw her a few moments after I went away last night?" demanded the provost. "Alas! yes, messire. Jésus Dieu! what a misfortune! The poor, dear child seemed a bit cast down as she went to take off all her beautiful court fixings. She put on a simple white dress--saints in Paradise, have pity on us!--and then she said to me, 'Dame Perrine, it's a lovely evening, and I will go and take a turn or two in my path.' It might have been about seven o'clock. Madame here," added Perrine, pointing to Pulchérie, the woman who had been installed as her assistant or superior,--"Madame here had already gone to her room, doubtless to work at those lovely dresses which she makes so well, and I was at work sewing in the room below. I don't know how long I remained there,--it is possible that after a while my poor tired eyes closed in spite of me, and that I lost myself a moment." "As usual," interposed Pulchérie sharply. "At all events," continued Dame Perrine, not deigning to reply to this insidious slander, "about ten o'clock I left my chair and went to the garden to see if Colombe had not forgotten herself. I called and found no one: I supposed then that she had gone to her own room and to bed without disturbing me, as the dear child has done a thousand times. Merciful Heaven! who would have thought--Ah! Messire le Prévôt, I can safely say that she followed no lover, but some ravisher. I reared her in the way--" "And this morning," the provost broke in impatiently, "this morning?" "This morning when I found that she didn't come down--Holy Virgin help us!" "To the devil with your litanies!" cried Messire d'Estourville. "Say what you have to say simply and without all these jeremiads. This morning?" "Ah! Monsieur le Prévôt, you can't prevent my weeping until she is found. This morning, messire, being alarmed at not seeing her (she is always so early!) I knocked at her door to wake her, and, as she did not answer, I opened the door. No one. The bed was not even rumpled, messire. With that I called and cried, and lost my head, and you want me not to weep!" "Dame Perrine," said the provost sternly; "have you admitted any one here during my absence?" "I admit any one! the idea!" rejoined the governess with every indication of stupefaction, feeling a little conscience-stricken in that regard. "Didn't you forbid me, messire? Since when, pray, have I allowed myself to disobey your orders? Admit some one? Oh yes, of course!"