My father stood as if in a dream, while my mother shed tears of joy and gratitude. A letter was now handed to her; and, hastily breaking the seal, she read, "Madeline, hast thou still a wish? Speak, and it shall be gratified!" "Only that I may be allowed to see my benefactress, to pour out at her feet my heart's gratitude." And at the instant the door opened, and the unknown appeared. Madeline, with clasped hands, darted suddenly forward; then, as suddenly checking herself, uttered some incoherent words, broken by sobs. "Madeline," said the lady, "I have paid but a small part of the debt I owe you. But for you a ferocious mob would have murdered me and my children. To you I owe lives dearer to me than my own. Do not deem me ungrateful in so long appearing to have forgotten you. It has pleased our Heavenly Father to visit me also with heavy trials. Like you, I have seen my children in want of food which I had not to give, and without a spark of fire to warm their chilled limbs. But more, my husband was traitorously put to death, and I have been myself proscribed. When you rescued me, they were hunting me like a wild beast, because I refused to take part against the son of my brother. But brighter days have dawned. My son is restored to the throne of his fathers, and Henrietta of England can now pay the debt of gratitude she owes Madeline Perrault." "But how can poor Madeline ever pay the debt she owes?" exclaimed my mother. "By sometimes coming to visit me in my retreat at Chaillot; for what has a queen without a kingdom, a widow weeping for her murdered husband, a mother forever separated from her children--what has she any more to do with the world whose nothingness she has so sadly experienced? To know that amid my desolation I have made one being happy, will be soothing to me, and your children's innocent merriment perchance may beguile some lonely hours. Henceforth, Madeline, our intercourse will not bear the romantic character that has hitherto marked it, and which chance, in the first instance, and afterward a whim of mine, has made it assume. By accident I was led to take refuge in your house in the Rue des Bourdonnais, and instantly recollected it as the former abode of Ruggieri, my mother's astrologer. His laboratory was the vault which doubtless you have not forgotten, and the entrance to which was as well known to me as the subterraneous passage by which I left it, and which led to the Cemetery of the Innocents. Last night I heard all you said to the superior, and was about to inquire directly of yourself, when, seeing the effect of my sudden appearance, I was induced to play the fairy once more. The instant you left me I put in requisition the only fairy wand I possessed, and money soon placed at my disposal the house which I have the happiness of making once again your own. You now know my secret, but though no fairy, I have still some influence, and you shall ever have in me a firm friend and protectress."