"He cried out, and dashed into the bedroom and bolted the door. I never saw any one in such a state of terror, Flore; he was trembling all over; his face was whiter than your apron." "Vraiment!" returned Flore, turning to look at her mistress in a little surprise. "But, madame, what had terrified him? What was it that he had seen?" "Why, he could have seen nothing," corrected Mrs. Fennel. "There was nothing to see." "Madame has reason; there could have been nothing, the house being empty. But then, what could have frightened him?" repeated Flore. "Why, he must have fancied it, I suppose. Any way, he fancied some one was there. The first question he asked me was, whether you were in the house." "Moi! Monsieur might have known I should not be in the house at that hour, madame. And why should he show terror if he thought it was me?" Mrs. Fennel shrugged her shoulders. "It was a moment's scare; just that, I conclude; and it upset his nerves. A sea-bath will put him all right again." Flore carried the coffee into the salon, and her mistress sat down to breakfast. Now it chanced that this same week a guest came to stay with Madame Carimon. Stella Featherston, from Buttermead, was about to make a sojourn in Paris, and she took Sainteville on her route that she might stay a few days with her cousin, Mary Carimon, whom she had not seen for several years. Lavinia and Ann Preen had once been very intimate with Miss Featherston, who reached Madame Carimon's on the Thursday. On the Friday morning Mrs. Fennel called to see her--and, in Nancy's impromptu way, she invited her and Mary Carimon to take tea at seven o'clock that same evening at the Petite Maison Rouge. Nancy went home delighted. It was a little divertissement to her present saddened life. Captain Fennel knitted his brow when he heard of the arrangement, but made no objection in words. His wife shrank at the frown. "Don't you like my having invited Miss Featherston to tea, Edwin?" "Oh! I've no objection to it," he carelessly replied. "I am not in love with either Carimon or his wife, and don't care how little I see of them." "He cannot come, having a private class on to-night. And I could not invite Miss Featherston without Mary Carimon," pleaded Nancy. "Just so. I am not objecting." With this somewhat ungracious assent, Nancy had to content herself. She ordered a gâteau Suisse, the nicest sort of gâteau to be had at Sainteville; and told Flore that she must for once remain for the evening. The guests appeared punctually at seven o'clock. Such a thing as being invited for one hour, and strolling in an hour or two after it, was a mark of English breeding never yet heard of in the simple-mannered French town. Miss Featherston, a smart, lively young woman, wore a cherry-coloured silk; Mary Carimon was in black; she had gone into slight mourning for Lavinia. Good little Monsieur Jules had put a small band on his hat.