* * * * * +-----------------------------------------------------------+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | Inconsistent hyphenation in the original document has | | been preserved. | | | | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. For | | a complete list, please see the end of this document. | | | +-----------------------------------------------------------+ * * * * * MLLE. FOUCHETTE _THIRD EDITION_ [Illustration: FOUCHETTE] MLLE. FOUCHETTE BY CHARLES THEODORE MURRAY ILLUSTRATED BY W.H. RICHARDSON E. BENSON KENNEDY & FRANCIS DAY [Illustration] PHILADELPHIA & LONDON J.B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY MCMII COPYRIGHT, 1902 BY CHARLES THEODORE MURRAY _All rights reserved_ Published March, 1902 _Printed by J. B Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, U.S.A._ TO MR. R.F. ("TODY") HAMILTON A CHARMING GENTLEMAN, DELIGHTFUL TRAVELLING COMPANION, PRACTICAL PHILOSOPHER, AND RELIABLE FRIEND ILLUSTRATIONS FOUCHETTE _Frontispiece_ HIS STILL UNCONSCIOUS BURDEN Page 136 SHE SEIZED JEAN BY THE ARM " 182 IT WAS A CRITICAL MOMENT " 383 MLLE. FOUCHETTE CHAPTER I "Get along, you little beast!" Madame Podvin accompanied her admonition with a vigorous blow from her heavy hand. "Out, I say!" Thump. "You lazy caniche!" Thump. "You get no breakfast here this morning!" Thump. "Out with you!" Thump. In the mean time the unhappy object of these objurgations and blows had been rapidly propelled towards the open door, and was with a final thump knocked into the street. A stray dog? Oh, no; a dog is never abused in this way in Paris. It would probably cause a riot. It was only a wee bit of a child,--dirty, clothed in rags, with tangled blonde hair that had never, apparently, seen a comb, and whose little bare feet and thin ankles were incrusted with the dried filth of the gutters. Being only a child, the few neighbors who were abroad at that early hour merely grinned at her as she picked herself up and limped away without a cry or a word. "She's a tough one," muttered a witness. "She's got to be mighty tough to stand the Podvin," responded another. In the rapidly increasing distance the child seemed to justify these remarks; for she began to step out nimbly towards the town of Charenton without wasting time over her grievances. "All the same, I'm hungry," she said to herself, "and the streets of Charenton will be mighty poor picking half an hour hence."