She was kneeling on the bed now, her hands clasped with her pitiful little imploring gesture. Jeanne-Marie came close to her, and smoothed back her hair caressingly with her rough work-a-day fingers. "_Soyez tranquille, mon enfant_," she said, "you shall not be taken back to the convent, and no one shall make you a nun." "You promise?" said Madelon, catching hold of her arm, and looking into her face with eager, suspicious eyes; "you promise not to take me back?" "Yes, I promise," said the woman; "fear nothing, _ma petite_." "And you won't tell Aunt Therese that I ran away? For she would be so angry, you know; she wanted to make me a nun like herself; you won't tell her--you won't, you won't?" "No, no," said Jeanne-Marie. "I will tell nothing, you are quite safe here; now lie down and be quiet, and I will give you something nice to drink." But Madelon's eyes wandered; the terrified look came again, and she clung tighter and tighter to Jeanne-Marie. "Please ask Aunt Therese to go away!" she cried; "she is standing there in the corner of the room, staring at me; she will not move--there--there she is, don't you see? Oh, tell her to go away--she stares at me so, and oh! there is a coffin at her side, it is all over death's heads; Aunt Therese has a death's head--oh! take me away, take me away!" With a shriek of terror the child threw herself back on the bed, covering her eyes with her hands, burying her face in the pillow. Jeanne-Marie went to the top of the stairs and called "Jacques Monnier!" "_Hein?_" said the man, coming slowly to the door below, and standing with his broad figure framed in it. "Jacques," said Jeanne-Marie, "go at once for the doctor, and tell him to come here, for some one is very ill." "_Hein?_" said Jacques again, "does that concern me? I must attend to my own affairs, and finish my wine, Jeanne-Marie." "If you do not go this moment," said the woman, with a little stamp of her foot, "you shall never taste my wine again, with or without payment, Jacques, _et je tiens parole, moi!_" "There is other wine to be had in Le Trooz," answered the man sulkily, but moving nevertheless towards the entrance, when she was recalled by Jeanne-Marie. "Jacques," she said, coming two or three steps down the stairs, "if Monsieur le Docteur inquires who is ill, you will say it is my niece." "But she is then your niece, _la petite_," said Jacques, scratching his head as an outward expression of some inward perplexity. "You will tell Monsieur le Docteur what I say," repeated Jeanne-Marie imperiously, "and make haste;" and she went upstairs again, and closed the bed-room with a certain emphasis, as though to prevent further discussion.