"Because Babiche is gone," she answered triumphantly. "And Babiche wouldn't be gone from the house unless Maman were gone--so they've gone to the House in the Woods--to attend to the garden--with--" she frowned until she remembered "with Piqueur--unless he is too old to help--and now I will go--" It was curious how his voice faltered, he looked tireder and more unhappy than in the days when Octavia had made a game of making him happy. "Felicia," he groped for words as he faced the questioning-eyed child, "I--we--you--cannot go to the House in the Woods just now--I have Certain Legal Matters that must be attended to--but we--we will go some day--" She accepted this with all the earnestness of her eleven years. But at the door she paused, shyly. He looked very "cross and worried." "This afternoon, if you wish," she said, "I will play chess with you. I can do three gambits. I tried them alone yesterday. We'll not play in Maman's room--but in the garden--" But for some strange reason he did not smile at all when he called "Check!" He only bent his head over her hand and kissed it as he had kissed her mother's. It was the first caress he had ever given her. She put the hand against her cheek and loved it when he was gone. And clambering up to bed she paused outside her mother's door. "Maman, we were a little happy in the garden--" she whispered, "were you happy in your garden?" Interminable days followed, dreary days punctuated with quarrel after quarrel. It sometimes seemed to Octavia's unhappy daughter that there was nothing she could touch without Mademoiselle's disapproval. The garments that had hung in the wardrobes, lovely things that tempted the beauty-loving child, were all packed away in the storeroom back of the linen closet; the bits of ornaments and jewelry that Octavia had let the child play with were all tucked away. "It was Maman's--do not touch it!" "That was Louisa's, you cannot have it!" Or most fearful cry of all, "Put that shawl back, Felicia! It was Madame Josepha's--Louisa herself never wore it, it cost so much!" The storeroom key was kept in the pocket of Mademoiselle's black silk apron. Gradually the miserly soul locked away all that seemed desirable or lovely to Felicia. Of course there came a day when she stole the key and when she hid herself a whole blissful afternoon and rummaged joyously through dusty bandboxes and huge curved-top trunks. She had opened an iron-bound box last. And in the top had found a case marked, "Mme. J. Trenton, 8 Rue de la--" the rest was blurred. There were a lot of papers--all of them in French, in a queer old case of crushed leather. And when she thrust them carelessly underneath she found the tiniest muslin garments she had ever seen. They puzzled her greatly; she held one against her cheek instinctively.