They went up-stairs with her. Chelda, strange to say, chattered excitedly, and did not want to go to her room. Miss Gastonguay and Derrice did not respond, and she was forced to leave them. They were both sombre and regretful, and neither of them could sleep, although they both threw themselves upon their beds. Toward morning, Derrice saw through the open door that Miss Gastonguay was leaving her room. She sprang up, and, running out to the hall, found she was fully dressed. "What do you want, child?" asked Miss Gastonguay. "I want to ask you to let that young man go," said Derrice, firmly. "I believe he is sorry by this time." "Little fool, would you have crime stalk unpunished through the land?" "No, but he is so young." "Go back to bed. I will see to him." "You will let him go," said Derrice, snatching her hand and pressing it to her lips. "I see it in your eye." CHAPTER XXI. MISS GASTONGUAY INTERVIEWS HER PRISONER. Miss Gastonguay found Prosperity sitting in the shadow of the wash-tubs, holding one end of a long rope that he had knotted firmly around his prisoner's waist. The young burglar, seeing that nothing could be done, had fallen asleep. Prosperity was presiding over his slumbers in fascinated awe, and nearly jumped out of his skin when Miss Gastonguay touched him on the shoulder. "Go join your brother," and she pointed to Tribulation, who was patrolling the kitchen passage, holding over his shoulder a Revolutionary musket that he had brought from the attic. "You'll hold the prisoner?" said Prosperity, surrendering the rope to her. "Yes, I'll hold him. Go away now, and shut the door, and don't listen." Prosperity tiptoed out, and seating herself on an upturned firkin, she seized a stick used for agitating clothes in boiling water, and gently stirred the sleeper with it. He opened his eyes and calmly stared at her. "You're a nice young man," she said, ironically, and turning a lamp bracket nearer his face and farther away from her own. He made no reply to this remark, beyond cautiously moving his foot. "Is it any better?" she asked. "Yes, that old coon rubbed it. I'm much obliged, ma'am." His manner was slightly conciliatory, yet she broke into denunciation. "You need not try to soften me. You ought to be hanged. If a few young rascals like you were strung up, you'd save a million others following in your steps. Now what have I ever done that you should break into my house, and try to rob me of hard-earned money,--money earned by the sweat of the brow of my ancestors. Who are you, I say, that you should deprive me of it?" "The world owes me a living," he said, sullenly. "A living--an honest living. Now what do you make out of your line of life,--just tell me?" "Lots of fun, when I have any luck." "You are lazy," she said, angrily, "too lazy to put up with quiet toil and small results."