“_Mon Dieu_,” Pierre ejaculated, with a shrug of his shoulders and a rapid movement of his hands, “Madame La Rue Christine Bodine! I am very much, yes, I suppose I am very much astonished!” But he was not. He had never shared Reinette’s implicit faith in Christine, and he put things together rapidly, and to himself he thought: “Yes, madame is Christine. I am not surprised;” but to Reinette he said, “Who told you? There must be some mistake, madame surely would never have kept silent so long.” “There _is_ no mistake. I can trust you, Pierre, and I begin to feel as if you were the only one I can trust. Everything and everybody is slipping away from me. This is the letter from the agent in Mentone, who paid her the money for Messrs. Polignie in Paris. You know you were in their office once with father and saw him give his check for twelve hundred and fifty francs to be sent to her. Read the letter, Pierre, and you will know all I do.” She handed it to him, and striking a light he read it through, while Reinette watched him narrowly to see what effect it had upon him. But aside from frequent ejaculations of surprise he made no comment, and just then the dinner-bell rang again, this time long and loud as if the ringer were growing impatient. “Oh, that dreadful bell,” Reinette exclaimed, putting her hands to her ears to shut out the sound. “Will they never stop ringing it, or understand that I am not coming? Go, Pierre, and tell them to clear the table away; tell them I am sick and tired, and wish to be let alone; tell them anything to keep them away from me. No body must come to-night but you. Go quick, before they ring again, or Mrs. Jerry comes herself. She must not know what we do.” Thus entreated Pierre departed with the message to Mrs. Jerry, and then went back to Reinette who sat with her hands clasped tightly together and a look on her white face which puzzled him, for he did not know that she was bravely fighting down a suspicion to harbor which would be to dishonor her father in his grave. “Pierre,” she said, lifting her dry, heavy eyes appealingly to him, and speaking like a sick child which wants to be petted; “Pierre, I am strangely shaken by this news, because I do not understand why Christine should wish to hide her identity from me, when she knew how I wanted to find her. It looks as if there was something which she wished to keep from me—something wrong in her life after she left us—and was married to M. La Rue. I had so much faith in and love for her, and now—oh, Pierre, it makes me cold, and sick, and faint. Forget that I am a woman; try and fancy me a little girl again, as I was when you first came to Chateau des Fleurs, and take me up and carry me to the couch. I could not walk there to save my life, for the strength has all gone from my body.”