soon have forgotten her! No wonder then she fainted; and, when recovered from her swoon, she declined--nay, peremptorily refused all assistance to take her home--that toiling home, now made doubly painful; she returned to it nearly mad. The _concièrge_, who had taken charge of her boy, was terrified at the paleness of that still face. Minnie said she had a motive for wishing much to go; and the good-natured woman, thinking it so natural, at once consented to keep the boy with her. "_Pauvre pétite_," said the woman to herself, as she gave the almost silent Minnie her key and lamp. "She has seen her monsieur, I dare say. Ah! I always thought she was not married--but forsaken, and with her child, too! _pauvre pétite!_ I will bring up Guillaume," she said aloud. "_Tenez!_ you can scarcely support your own weight, much less his! I'll bring him up to you." And Minnie thanked her in a whisper, and crept almost lifeless up the stairs. As yet she had confided nothing of her history to her old neighbour, whom she only knew as a poor man named Georges, who had lost place and fortune. By persuading him that he was useful to her, she had succeeded in making him more frequently her guest, than his own solitary companion. She feared speaking of the past; yet, so much did she love the venerable old man, that she longed to dare confide all, and ask his advice. Now she felt her total inability to act for herself, and resolved to tell him not later than the following day. But there is a destiny ever above ruling, far superior to our puny wills. Next day she was too ill to speak, or see him; she was confined to her bed, where the intense anguish of her mind drove madness through her frame; and the following one she was delirious, and her shrieking voice could only utter one name--"Tremenhere!" It was no moment for false delicacy. The old man, whom she had befriended, stood by her in her need, and the trembling hands wiped the cold moisture from her brow, or held the cup of _tizane_ to her lips. Little Miles was nursed below; and though her eye wandered, seeking something in her madness, she uttered but the one name, sometimes in accents of prayer, sometimes in shrieking horror, for the promised morrow was with her, even in her delirium! CHAPTER XVI.