"Eagle!" I pleaded. "Don't you know me? You surely know Lazarre!" She kissed me, pulling my head down in her arms, the velvet mouth like a baby's, and looked straight into my eyes. "Madame, try to understand! I am Louis! If you forget Lazarre, try to remember Louis!" She heard with attention, and smiled. The pressure of my arms spoke to her. A man's passion addressed itself to a little child. All other barriers which had stood between us were nothing to this. I held her, and she could never be mine. She was not ill in body; the contours of her upturned face were round and softened with much smiling. But mind-sickness robbed me of her in the moment of finding her. "She can't be insane!" I said aloud. "Oh, God, anything but that! She was not a woman that could be so wrecked." Like a fool I questioned, and tried to get some explanation. Eagle smoothed my arm, nested her hand in my neck. "My little boy! He has grown to be a man--while his mother has grown down to be a child! Do you know what I am now, Paul?" I choked a sob in my throat and told her I did not. "I am your Cloud-Mother. I live in a cloud. Do you love me while I am in the cloud?" I told her I loved her with all my strength, in the cloud or out of it. "Will you take care of me as I used to take care of you?" I swore to the Almighty that she should be my future care. "I need you so! I have watched for you in the woods and on the water, Paul! You have been long coming back to me." I heard Madame Ursule mounting the stairs to see if my room was in order. Who could understand the relation in which Eagle and I now stood, and the claim she made upon me? She clung to my arm when I took it away. I led her by the hand. Even this sight caused Madame Ursule a shock at the head of the stairs. "M's'r Williams!" My hostess paused and looked at us. "Did she come to you of her own accord?" "Yes, madame." "I never knew her to notice a stranger before." "Madame, do you know who this is?" "Madeleine Jordan." "It is the Marquise de Ferrier." "The Marquise de Ferrier?" "Yes, madame." "Did you know her?" "I have known her ever since I can remember." "The Marquise de Ferrier! But, M's'r Williams, did she know you?" "She knows me," I asserted. "But not as myself. I am sure she knows me! But she confuses me with the child she lost! I cannot explain to you, madame, how positive I am that she recognizes me; any more than I can explain why she will call me Paul. I think I ought to tell you, so you will see the position in which I am placed, that this lady is the lady I once hoped to marry." "Saints have pity, M's'r Williams!" "I want to ask you some questions." "Bring her down to the fire. Come, dear child," said Madame Ursule, coaxing Eagle. "Nobody is there. The bedrooms can never be so warm as the log fire; and this is a bitter evening."